Top 50 Cal Sports Moments -- No. 47: Chicago Seven, 1922

Seven Cal athletes traveled to the Windy City and dominated the second-ever NCAA Track and Field Championships, stunning local favorite Illinois

Cal track and field star Jack Merchant / Photo courtesy of Cal Athletics

As the Pac-12 Conference era comes to a close after more than a century, we count down the Top 50 moments involving Cal athletics.

THE MOMENT: Jack Merchant’s victory in the hammer throw was no surprise, but when he also captured the shot put Cal’s path to the 1922 NCAA Track and Field Championship was wide open.

THE STORY: Illinois won the first NCAA Track and Field Championships in 1921. When the meet returned to Stagg Field in Chicago in ’22, the Illini were expected to repeat as champions.

Not everyone felt that way. Dink Templeton, who would go on to win three national titles as coach at Stanford, viewed his Bay Area rival as the clear favorite. “California should win the meet,” he wrote in the San Francisco Call-Bulletin.

Coach Walter Christie’s seven-man squad decisively prevailed, thanks primarily to their two Olympic stars. Brick Muller, also a football All-American and Rose Bowl hero, was a silver medalist in the high jump at the 1920 Antwerp Olympics. At the NCAAs, June 16-17, Muller was second in the broad jump (23 feet, 8 1/2 inches), third in the high jump (6-1 1/2) and fourth in the discus (127-8).

The real difference-maker for the Bears was Merchant, who competed in the long jump at the 1920 Olympics and the hammer throw at the ’24 Games in Paris. Three weeks before the NCAAs, at the Intercollegiate Association of Amateur Athletics of America meet at Cambridge, Mass., Merchant won the hammer with a record throw of 171-2.

He matched that victory at Chicago with a mark of 161-4 that topped the field by 25 feet. When he won the shot put with a heave of 44-6 1/2 the meet’s outcome was settled. Merchant also placed fourth in the broad jump.

The Bears also got contributions from Harry McDonald (second in the 440-yard dash), Allen Norris (second in the pole vault), Sandy Sorrenti (third in the javelin), Jack Witter (third in the shot) and Ted Treyer (part of a nine-way tie for fifth in the high jump).

Treyer’s efforts accounted for the fraction in Cal’s final team score: 28 1/8 points. Penn State was second with 19 1/2 points and Illinois was a disappointment, finishing fourth with 15 7/10 points.

The New York Times saluted the Bears’ victory, writing, “Without any question, they are the best group of track and field athletes in the country.”

* Top 50 Moment No. 48: Wide Right

* Top 50 Moment No. 49: Triumphant Spirit

Only specific acts that occurred while the team or athlete was at Cal were considered for the Top 50 list, and accomplishments spanning a season or a career were not included. 

Leslie Mitchell of the Cal Bears History Twitter site aided in the selection of the top 50 moments.

Follow Jeff Faraudo of Cal Sports Report on Twitter: @jefffaraudo