There will be no new Nina Schultz records set this year – at least on the NCAA circuit.
New Westminster’s and Canada’s rising track star made a surprising move last week when she transferred to the University of Georgia, midway through her third year at Kansas State.
It means Schultz, 19, will red-shirt this current season and won’t compete on the university circuit until 2020.
Georgia’s women’s track and field team, like the men’s, is the current reigning NCAA national champion.
It was part of a two-athlete announcement for the Bulldogs, who received the commitment of javelin thrower Ahmed Magour also last week.
"Nina and Ahmed are great additions to our team and we look forward to having them perform at a high level with us during the 2020 season," said Georgia head coach Petros Kyprianou. "Both are world-class athletes with personal records that could potentially help our teams win again. They both are very serious student-athletes who care about winning NCAA titles and being on Olympic teams.”
In her time at Kansas, the New West Spartans Track and Field Club product delivered the mail in her major events, finishing second in the pentathlon at the 2018 NCAA Indoor championships, and in the outdoor nationals placed seventh overall in the heptathlon. As a freshman, she finished second in the heptathlon at the 2017 NCAA outdoor meet, after debuting at the 2017 NCAA nationals indoor event with the third-best score in pentathlon. A four-time All-American, Schultz established new marks for the school in both pentathlon and heptathlon.
She set multiple personal bests that put her No. 7 among all-time performers with 6,133 points in the heptathlon, and 4,502 points in the pentathlon. Schultz also posted a high jump clearance of 1.85 metre and distance of 6.39m in the long jump.
The Big-12 Outstanding freshman of the year in 2017, Schultz was also a two-time recipient of the United States Track and Field and Cross Country Coaches’ Midwest Region’s female athlete of the year award.
Schultz represented Canada at last year’s Commonwealth Games in Australia, returning home as the heptathlon’s silver medalist, after setting Canadian under-20 national records in both the pentathlon and heptathlon.
