ENGINEERS CONSTRUCT ANOTHER CONFERENCE VICTORY
MIT's Eighth Consecutive Title
April 26, 2008
MIT had won seven consecutive NEWMAC titles in a row and eight of the nine since the conference's inception in 1999. For the second year in succession, the meet was a toss-up based on the seeds. Last year, Springfield College presented the challenge, this year the culprit was a very talented team from the Coast Guard Academy, a program that has been building steadily over the years and were ready to take command of the conference. Based on the seeds the meet was dead even--determination and some good fortune would make the difference.
On a day when the wind swirled and was usually at the face of the sprinters and jumpers and the sun would come out to expose 65 degree temperatures and then go behind the clouds as the temperatures dropped to mid 50s, MIT started slowly, built to a series of solid performances and finished with a flurry of points to open up a commanding lead en route to their eighth consecutive championship with 240 points to 188.5 for Coast Guard, 146 for Springfield, 119.5 for WPI, 71 for Wheaton and 3 for Babson.
The first event, the 10K, an event MIT usually dominates did not go as expected. A Coast Guard runner took the pace out hard with a 75 second opening 400, disrupting MIT's strategy and forcing Tech's runners to abandon their plan and for a chase group. This amended plan worked for Jack Bourbonnais, who won with a 32:53.30 on the windy day, but Trevor Rundell and Gihan Amarasiriwardena could not maintain the pace. Rundell ran 33:16.78 for fifth and Amarasiriwardena faded to seventh with a 33:43.70. In 2007, MIT's times would have garnered 1-2-3. Coast Guard placed second and fourth to garner 13 points, starting the meet three points in arrears.
The next final was the long jump. MIT was seeded to score 15 points while Coast Guard was set to score 21. Stephen Morton came through on his final attempt to jump 22-4 1/4 for the victory and Anthony Teixeira jumped 21-8 3/4 to claim third. Their efforts combined with an eighth place jump by Mattias Flander netted 17 points while Coast Guard slipped to second and fourth place for only 13 points. The high jump went almost as expected as MIT scored no points while Coast Guard scored 17, three less than expected.
Back on the track, the steeplechase was a huge breakthrough and made up for the surprise results of the 10K. Freshmen Paul Welle and Richard Prevost, distant third and fourth seeds, ran 18 second personal bests to place first and second respectively with times of 9:34.34 and 9:35.62. Rocco Repetski ran to a season best of 10:04.13 for sixth place, giving MIT 21 points, seven more than planned for.
In the Javelin, Vlad Sobes had a huge personal best of 189-4 to move up to place third after being seeded sixth. Coast, seeded to score 21 points only netted 16, another tough blow for the Bears. Also in the field events and perhaps the most crushing blow, Coast Guard's second vaulter no-heighted and MIT displayed the best vault day in school history when Greg Tao (15-6), Patrick Barragan (14-9) and Nate Sharpe (13-3 1/2) all jumped to personal bests and Omari Stephens cleared 14-9 before bowing out with a tight groin for a 1-2-3-7 finish.
In the 1500, Jake Ruzevick continued his comeback with a 4:00.15 third place effort. Accompanying Ruzevick's performance were Joy Roy-Mayhew running 4:04.68 for fifth and Chris Wong at 4:05.56 for sixth. In one of the few events that did not go quite as well as MIT would have liked, Teixeira had a bad race in the high hurdles, placing fifth while Dave Fernholz did not even make the finals after being seeded seventh. Fortunately, the fourth seeded Stephens moved up to second place to minimize the losses.
Stephen Oney ran his best race of the outdoor season with a 50.86 in the 400, good for sixth place. Right after that, Morton came through as the number one seed in the 100 as he claimed first running a 11.32 into a 2.3 meter per second head wind. Coast Guard scored four points less than they were seeded to continue their slide.
In the triple jump, Morton still could not find his indoor form as he only jumped 44-2 3/4 for fifth place. Fortunately, Teixeira continued his outstanding day with a third place 45-3 1/2 jump and Mattias Flander leaped to a fourth place 44-9 3/4 effort. However, Coast Guard managed to win the event and three more points than they were seeded to score.
Nick Leonard ran a well timed personal best as he continues to learn and improve in the 400IH. Leonards' time of 57.19 gave him a third place finish, one place higher than expected. The 800, the event MIT needed the most, gave MIT 14 more points as Matt Bieniosek led teammates Bill Phipps, Dave Reshef and Kevin Kleinguetl to the finish line in 4th, 5th, 6th and 7th places with respective times of 1:57.44, 1:57.65, 1:57.78 and 1:58.51. Again, Coast Guard was seeded to score 18 points and only pulled out 15.
Tony McDonald led the throwers with placing in three different events, placing fifth in the hammer with a 151-10 effort, sixth in the discus at 130-3 and sixth in the shot at 44-0 3/4. While McDonald scored in three events, James Oleinik made his two events count. Oleinik won the shot with a put of 48-10 1/4 and placed second in the discus with a personal best of 137-9. The discus was one of MIT's best events of the day as the Engineers scored three more points than they were seeded thanks in part to the seventh place finish by Mitch Kelley while Coast Guard dropped nine more points by only scoring nine as two of their top seeds failed to score.
In the 200, Morton ran cautiously, ending up with the second place he was seeded to get. However, Teixeira, not seeded to score pulled out a personal best of 22.95 to place fifth and again move MIT up in the scoring column. The final individual event of the day, the 5000, totally sealed the meet for MIT. Roy-Mayhew backed up his fine 1500 with a well run 15:22.12 victory. Supporting his effort, Hemagiri Arumugam, Brian Jacokes and Chris Wong placed third, fourth and fifth respectively to score 27 for Tech while Coast Guard only managed six after being seeded for 10.
MIT ran season bests in both the 400 and 1600 meter relays. In the 4x100, the foursome of Teixeira, Leonard, Flander and Morton placed third in 43.23. In the 4x400, the final event of the meet, Oney, Reshef, Bieniosek and Kleinguetl placed third in 3:22.98.
Next weekend, MIT travels to Coast Guard for the New England Division III Championship where the Bears will want some revenge and the opportunity to prove they are the better team.