Long's Sprint Sweep Inspired By Mother's Untimely Passing In February

By Lori Shontz for DyeStat  

Logan Hannigan-Downs photos

When she walked out for the 100-meter final Saturday afternoon at the NCAA Division 1 Outdoor Track and Field Championships, Ole Miss sprinter McKenzie Long squatted down, as usual, to adjust the blocks. And then she realized that for the first time in her track career, she didn’t need to.

The blocks were already set. Perfectly. To her numbers, exactly.

“I was like, MOM,” Long said.  

All season long, Long has been running for her mom, Tara Jones, who died suddenly of a heart attack in February. Jones, a psychiatric travel nurse in Hawaii, went to sleep one night and never woke up. She was only 45 years old. She’s never far from her daughter’s thoughts, and when Long saw the blocks, she immediately felt calm. “I felt her with me,” Long said.

Because of that moment, Long said that’s the race she’ll remember most from her final NCAA championships. But she has a lot of good memories from her long day at Hayward Field as she became the sixth female sprinter to sweep the 100 meters, 200 meters and 4x100 relay at the same championship meet.

She won the 100 in a wind-aided 10.82 seconds, becoming the first Ole Miss sprinter to win the event. She ran the second leg on the 4x100 as Ole Miss won its first NCAA title in the event. And she dominated the 200 in 21.83 seconds, the fastest time in the world this season.

“All of this, I really just put everything I have into it,” Long said. “I trusted my mom, I trusted God, I just allowed my abilities to come through. That’s what I did.”

Long started her college career at North Carolina State, where she was a three-time East Region qualifier plus the school record holder in the outdoor 200 and two relays. But she didn’t compete in 2021-22 because of a hip injury that required surgery, and when she finished her undergraduate degree, she entered the transfer portal.

That’s where Ole Miss sprints coach Holland Sherrer noticed her. He was impressed with her numbers, and they began talking. One particular conversation, as he sat on his patio, stands out. Long told him that she’d been told she would never run as fast as she did before the surgery, and she added, “I want to prove everyone wrong.”

Said Sherrer, “It was in that moment that I was like, ‘This is the one.’”

He did not, however, think he’d recruited a future three-time NCAA champion, simply a sprinter with the talent to be “really, really good.” Long progressed steadily – especially once Sherrer and head coach Connie Price-Smith had convinced her she could run the 100, too. Long said the same thing over and over: “I’m not a 100 runner. I’m not a 60 runner. I’m a 200 girl.”

And she did excel in the 200 first, winning the SEC outdoor title in 2023 while finishing third in the 100. At NCAA outdoors, she finished second in the 200 behind Julien Alfred, who last season became the fifth female sprinter to sweep the 100, 200 and 4x100. (The other four: Randy Givens of Florida State in 1984, Dawn Sowell of LSU in 1989, Esther Jones of LSU in 1990 and Carlette Guidry of Texas in 1991.)

Long had one more year of eligibility remaining, and when she decided to take it, Sherrer said, “Listen, if you do that, you have to win. You have to win, and you have to go and try to break the collegiate record.”

Long agreed. When she was visiting her mom in Hawaii over the winter break, she talked not just about the NCAA championships, but even potentially making Team USA for the Paris Olympics. “That’s all we talked about,” Long said. And then, not even two months later, her mom died.

“She’s an incredibly resilient person,” Sherrer said. “I think myself and Coach Connie and the rest of the staff and her teammates were just there to remind her how strong, how resilient, she really is.”

For her big day, Long got up early, ate some oatmeal, drank a breakfast shake and ordered a chicken and cheese quesadilla from Chipotle when she got to the track. She doesn’t like to run on an empty stomach, and she didn’t think her typical peanut butter and jelly was quite enough as she was attempting the triple.

Ole Miss started the day by winning the 4x100, with Long being supported by Akilah Lewis, Gabrielle Matthews and Jahniya Bowers to finish in 42.34, ahead of LSU (42.57) and South Carolina (42.63). Long then bested a strong field in the 100, beating LSU’s Brianna Lyston (10.89), Texas Tech’s Rosemary Chukwuma (10.90) and Oregon's Jadyn Mays (10.95). 

And she finished strong in the 200, although she fell .03 short of the collegiate record of 21.80, set by Abby Steiner of Kentucky in 2022. Her time of 21.83 was comfortably ahead of South Carolina’s JaMeesia Ford (22.08) and Mays' (22.19). As Long crossed the finish line, she said, she was bawling.

“Honestly, without grieving and going through that process, I don’t think I could have found myself this season,” she said. “I definitely found myself this season, and that really helped me grow as an athlete, grow as a person. I’m just getting stronger every day.”

Long said her mom didn’t love coming to her track meets. They made her nervous. The last competition Jones attended, the 2023 SEC Championships, she had to leave the stadium before her daughter ran.

“But now I know that she’s running with me – she can actually watch me run,” Long said. “I know that makes her proud, and she can stop being nervous now.” Long paused, and she giggled, then got serious again. “I’m doing this for her.”