ANN ARBOR, Mich. – It’s one thing to win a national title. It’s another to truly run away with a championship.
Michigan Wolverines star Savannah Sutherland took the top spot in the 400-meter hurdles at the NCAA Championships, winning by 2.2 seconds in her last collegiate race.
A run that earned Sutherland her second NCAA title in the event in the last three years.
“I left everything out there on the track,” Sutherland told Local 4. “It honestly was just a storybook ending to my four years here.”
A championship performance that also set a new NCAA record. Sutherland finished in 52.46 seconds, breaking the previous mark by nearly three-tenths of a second.
“I knew it was a lofty goal, and I didn’t know if I ever was going to get there, but it’s something that I had in the back of my head,” Sutherland said.
And when she crossed the finish line, Sutherland knew the record was all her own.
“We were very aware of what the record was going into the race, and we knew that was a possibility,” Sutherland said. “I’ve had that number playing in my head over and over.”
What makes the feat even more impressive is the record she broke at the NCAAs.
That college record is one previously held by former national champ and 2024 Olympic gold medalist Sydney McLaughlin.
“I looked up to her for so long,” Sutherland said of McLaughlin. “It’s pretty surreal to even have my name in the same conversation as hers. That’s something that still hasn’t quite set in.”
Sutherland raced alongside McLaughlin at the 2024 Olympics in Paris, becoming the first Canadian woman to reach the Olympic final of the 400-meter hurdles since 1996.
An experience in Paris that proved she belongs as she now prepares to make another run at the 2028 Olympic games.
“That confidence really carried me through my senior season,” Sutherland said of the Olympics experience. “Knowing that no matter who is on this track, I deserve my spot here, and I’ve earned it.”