|
Jumbo Tyler Andrews is the 2013 ECAC champion in the 10,000 meters
|
SPRINGFIELD - The Jumbo men's track & field team notched one victory and eight scoring performances to place third of 65 teams in the ECAC Championship at Springfield College on Thursday and Friday.
NESCAC rival Bates won the meet with 79 points, while Oneonta took second with 55. The Jumbos' score of 45.33 was good enough for third, while Cortland State and MIT rounded out the top five with 43.33 and 40 points respectively.
The ECAC meet is the final opportunity to qualify for next weekend's NCAA Championships.
Senior Gbola Ajayi (Lagos, Nigeria) improved his national standing to sixth with a season-best leap of 48'3 ¼" (14.71m) in the triple jump to place second.
In the hammer, senior tri-captain Curtis Yancy (St. Louis, MO) launched a personal-best distance of 185'0" (56.38m) to place second. That mark is the second-best in school history and moves Yancy to 21st on the national list. Unfortunately, only 20 athletes qualify for NCAA's, so Yancy will have to hope one athlete ranked ahead of him decides not to declare for the national meet.
One school record was matched on Thursday, as junior Dan Lange Vagle (St. Paul, MN) clocked a time of 10.90 in the prelims of the 100 to tie the record set by Phil Rotella in 2009. Lange Vagle placed 11th in the final on Friday.
The only victory of the meet was recorded by senior Tyler Andrews (Concord, MA), as he clocked a time of 31:06.47 in the 10,000 on Thursday evening.
Before Andrews took to the track, the 4x400 meter relay team of Lange Vagle junior Graham Beutler (Weston, CT), senior Vinnie Lee (Walpole, MA), and freshman Mitch Black (Brunswick, ME) clocked a time of 3:17.21 to place third.
Beutler returned to the track on Friday to place seventh in the 200 with a time of 21.95. In the 1,500, classmate Jamie Norton (Groton, MA) took third in a time of 3:53.07.
Coach Ethan Barron's team will now turn their attention to next weekend's NCAA Championship at the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse. Ajayi (triple jump), Norton (1,500), Black (800), junior Ben Wallis (steeplechase), and seniors Mike Blair (Wellesley, MA) (decathlon) and Matt Rand (Cape Elizabeth, ME) (10,000) will represent the Jumbos on the national stage next week.
Meet results
#
