MIT Men and Women Dominate Bates and Colby in Season Opener

Alumni Bring Strong Contingent to Alumni/ae Meet

January 10, 2015

Kicking off the 2015 Indoor Track & Field Season, MIT tried something new from a competitive standpoint. Due to calendar challenges, the Engineers combined their 42nd annual Alumni/ae Meet with the annual Bates/Colby/MIT tri-meet. While the event had its challenges, such as some events were only scored for alums (3K, 4x200) and some only scored for the varsity teams (600, 1000, 5K, 4x400, DMR), by all accounts the meet was a resounding success. In the end, MIT swept all victories, winning both the men's varsity and women's varsity events, defeating the Bates and Colby alums in both genders and the varsity took down the undermanned "Has Beens".

Both Bates and Colby were very gracious in agreeing to this format. They got the word out to their alums, but with relatively short notice a total of nine participants represented the alumni teams for the Maine schools. Those who did attend faired quite well. Mike Martin, formerly of Bates, earned fourth place overall in the 3K, placing first among alums in 8:56.92. Rich McNeil, also of Bates and a former MIT assistant coach, placed second overall in the Weight Throw and fourth overall in the Shot Put, taking first place among alums. Chris Murtagh finished fourth overall for the Bates alums and second in the alumni portion of the meet. Representing the women's side for the Bates alumnae, Abby Alexander, Kallie Nixon, Kristen Poulin, and Tina Tobin took down the MIT alumnae in the 4x200 Relay. For Colby, Will Barron was fifth overall in the Shot Put and second in the alumni competition, while Dan Vassallo was sixth overall in the Mile and second to Justin Bullock '14 of MIT in the alumni competition.

Having performed poorly in their annual Intrasquad Meet prior the holiday break, the MIT student-athletes were on notice by their captains and coaching staff that more was expected with regard to preparation and competitiveness. That message was apparently received loud and clear as the Engineers performed very well, winning 14 of the 18 events for the women's competition and 11 of the 18 events on the men's side of the ledger. The final score of the varsity competition was 189.5 for MIT to 107.5 for Bates and 47 for Colby in the women's meet and 194 for MIT, 103 for Bates and 57 for Colby in the men's meet, using a 7-5-4-3-2-1 scoring format. In the MIT vs. Alumni/ae meet, the varsity took down the alums 88 to 33 for the men and 92-25 for the women, using a scoring system of 5-3-1.

Their were many superb performances by MIT. Middle-Distance runners Colin Godwin '17 and Sarah Quinn '16 ran away with double victories. Godwin took the Mile (4:22.41) and 1000 (2:36.96) while Quinn won the Mile (5:01.0) and 800 (2:22.83). Veronica Szklarzewski '15 was not only a double winner in the Triple Jump (35-1 3/4) and 60 Meter Dash (8.05), but also took second in the Long Jump (16-3 3/4) and anchored the winning 4x200 Relay. Hannah Chen '18 has embraced the team concept fostered by the Engineers better than most freshmen and responded with a 26.71 victory in the 200, second place in the 60 Meter Dash in 8.11 after running 8.09 in the trials, a second place in the 60HH in 9.47 and an amazing 59.2 anchor leg in the 4x400 to almost pull out a come from behind victory. Matt Deyo '17 ran an excellent 8:37.55 3K victory, clicking off 69 second quarters on the tight turns of the MIT track. Ellen Liverpool '15 continued her amazing trend of setting personal bests, winning the 20lb. Weight Throw at 53-7 3/4. Nicole Zeinstra '16 showed she has her sights set on Nationals as she took first place honors in the 5K by nearly a minute with a 17:43.12 PR.

From the perspective of dominating events, the male horizontal jumpers representing MIT certainly stood out. In the Triple Jump, Angel Echevarria '16 led a one through four sweep with a 46-3 1/4 victory, and Carrington Motley '16 took the victory in the Long Jump at 21-4 3/4, leading his teammates to a 1-2-4-5-6 domination. While Bates College took victories in both the men's 60 Meter Dash and 60HH, MIT claimed second through fifth in both events, led by Michael Kaba '16 in 7.19 and 8.58 respectively. Luca Cacopardo '18 led a 1-3-4-5 finish in the 200 with an impressive 22.95 victory out of lane three. Sam Parker '15 brought a sense of senior year urgency to the 800, leading start to finish to win in 1:55.03. Teammate Rick Paez '15 was close behind in 1:56.61 for second place. Another event where the men lost, but dominated was the 5K. Bates Tully Hannan took the victory in 15:25.56, but Tech took the next five places, led by Brian Gilligan '17, all under 16:00.

The Tech women dominated in a few events. They swept one through five in the 60 Meter Dash, led by Szklarzewski and Chen. They also swept the top five places in the Pole Vault, led by Cimmy Virdi '16 at 12-2 1/2. The next four places were all at 10-2 3/4. Nneoma Okonkwo '18 led a 1-2-3 Long Jump finish with a leap of 17-2 1/4. Maryann Gong took first place honors in the 1000 in 3:00.59 as her teammates backed her up with places 3-4-5.

The MIT alumni performances were led by Omari Stephens '08, taking the Pole Vault and leading an alumni sweep at 14-8 and third in the 60HH in 8.95. Jordan Mizerak '14 took top scoring honors, claiming second in the Pole Vault at 13-8 1/4, second in the High Jump at 6-0 and third in the Long Jump with a leap of 20-02 1/2. Tyler Singer-Clark took two thirds, 7.31 in the 60 Meter Dash and 23.19 in the 200. Justin Bullock '14 earned second in the Mile with his 4:22.47. Thad Wozniak '06 keeps getting better with age, claiming second in the Long Jump at 20-09 1/4. Mitch Kelley '11 represented the thrower "Has Beens" with a second place in the Shot Put at 39-10 3/4. Logan Trimble '13 dropped down in distance, taking third place in the 400 in 55.96. Roy Wedge '14 placed third in the 3K in 9:23.46. Matt Falk '12 can still get it done, taking third in the High Jump at 5-8. Nate Sharpe '09 completed the Pole Vault sweep at 13-02 1/4. Finally, Zach Traina '05, Singer-Clark, Wozniak and Bullock took advantage of a disqualification in the 4x200 to win the 4x200 Relay.

For the MIT Alumnae, Lauren Kuntz '13 won the Pole Vault on misses at 12-2 1/2. Martina de Geus '14 led a 1-2-3 sweep in the 400 with a 65.35 victory. Stephanie Birkhimer '14 earned second place in the Triple Jump at 31-1 and third place in the 60HH in 10.77. Portia Jones '12 made a last minute decision to race the 200 and earned a very close second place in 26.73. Claiming second and third in that 400 sweep were Jamie Priest (Simmons) '12 and Kaitlin Allen '14 in 67.92 and 69.11 respectively. Taking second place in the 800, Alexandra Taylor '14 ran 2:30.38. Emily Cole (Hwang) '09 placed third in the Pole Vault at 10-8 3/4 to close out the scoring for the Alumnae.

Also participating were Nate Ball '05, Patrick Barragan '08, Ethan Crain '96, Mike DeMassa '97, Caroline Figgatt '11, Karin Fisher '11, Kyle Hannon '13, Eric Khatchadourian '06, Albert Lau '72, Nick Leonard '11, Maggie Lloyd '12, Peter Mulligan '08, Joe Roy-Mayhew '08, Justin Schmidt '10, Bill Singhose '90 and Peter Mulligan '08. Cheering for their teammates were Kirsten Aarsvold '11, Dave Afshartous '89, Alina Gatowski '11, Dan Harper '12, Tom Hansen '74, Brooke Johnson '13, Don Shobrys '75, Jason Tong '79, and CK Umachi '12.

Next week, MIT travels to Bowdoin College to compete in a 5-way competition with Bowdoin, RPI, Springfield and WPI with hopes of moving to 6-0.

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