PUEBLO, Colo.— Justin Thompson and Zace Buckhold scored in the long jump while the Colorado Mesa University men's track and field team qualified six runners in three events of preliminary round action on the first of three days of the Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference Outdoor Championships on Friday here at the CSU Pueblo ThunderBowl.

Thompson turned in a wind-aided leap of 7.58 meters (24 feet, 10 ½ inches), the best all-conditions mark in CMU history, to place third.  Five of his six jumps were taken with tail winds of 4.0 meters per second or higher.

Buckhold finished eighth in the event with a career-best of 7.04 meters (23-1.25) as the Mavericks scored all seven of their opening-day team points in that event, good enough for fifth place in the early going.

Meanwhile, on the track AJ Smallwood won his heat of the 400-meter prelims in a career-best 49.78 seconds to lead three Mavericks into Sunday's final.  He qualified third overall ahead of Kelsey Montague (49.88) and Dayne Ortega (50.36), who qualified fourth and sixth, respectively.

Jake Valdez (50.90) and Austin Reese (51.40) also competed in the event, taking 13^th and 17^th, respectively.

The Mavs also qualified two sprinters for the 100-meter final as Elijah Williams ran to a time of 10.68 to qualify sixth while Kade Christensen was just behind, finishing the preliminary rounds in seventh place at 10.78, moving him up to fifth on the Mavs' all-time performers' list.

The Mavericks also had four other sprinters finish 10^th-13^th.

Freshman Sterling Brassfield was tenth in 10.84 seconds and now ranks seventh in program history.  Jeremiah Wilson (10.92), Beau Thornton (10.93) and Jeremiah Reed (10.98) were right behind in varying wind conditions.

In the 400-meter hurdles, Casey McDaniel qualified seventh for Sunday's final in 55.49 seconds.  Jeremiah Otto (1:00.37) and Carl Heide (1:02.17) finished 17^th and 18^th, resecptively.

Elsewhere, Hayden Riley posted a career-best mark of 49.33 meters (161-10) to finish 12^th in the hammer throw.  Teammate Jameson Moore fouled on all three of his attempts in that event.

Nathan Sanches then capped the evening, taking 15^th in the 10,000 meters with a time of 32:38.42.