April 15, 2000
MIT took their 5-0 record to the home of the Tufts Jumbos with the hope of returning to Cambridge 8-0. Division II, UMass/Lowell, Bowdoin, and Tufts, all have considerable talent, but it proved to be insufficient to stop the Engineers from their quest as MIT claimed first with 226 points to 180 for UMass/Lowell, 140 for Tufts, and 113 for Bowdoin.
On Friday, when the seeds were released to the coaches, it was apparent that Bowdoin, who had a good chance of winning the meet if they decided to make the effort, would be satisfied with preparing athletes for later in the season by taking it easy on them in this meet. Tufts, still hurting from injuries incurred during the indoor season, would show good representation, but did not have enough, particularly in the jumping events, to present a serious challenge. UMass/Lowell not only had the personnel to gain the victory, they had their athletes positioned to get the job done. Lowell held the upper hand in the sprints through the 400, including the relays, and the throws. MIT had higher seeds in the 1500-5000, and the Triple Jump and Pole Vault. The 400IH, 800, Javelin, Long Jump, and High Jump were pretty even. MIT Coach Halston Taylor thought it would be these events that would decide the meet.
The first event, the Long Jump, proved to be an indicator of how things were to proceed for the remainder of the day. Jumping with the wind, the Lowell jumpers took the initial lead with first and second. Junius Ho '01, was the first Engineer to split them up, and Craig Mielcarz '03, joined him after his second attempt. Going into the finals, Craig had taken the lead, with Junius still in 3rd. In the second round of the finals, Mason of Lowell passed Mielcarz by 1 centimeter for the lead. Craig came back and retook the lead by 2 centimeters. In the next and final round, Mason seemed to put it away with a fine 22-2 effort, 15 centimeters ahead of Mielcarz. Craig was not to be denied. With plenty of support from his teammates, he hit the board well, sailing to 6.77/22-2 1/2 for the victory.
In the throws, some of the Bowdoin throwers did not show up, and it seemed that only the MIT throwers took advantage, scoring far more points than anticipated and more than they had all year. Peter Bluvas '01, competing with a pulled groin, was able to throw a personal best of 121-1 to place 3rd, and freshman Greg Walker, placed 4th with a personal best of his own at 118-7.
The Pole Vault, only had entries from Bowdoin and MIT. Last week, Bowdoin had handed MIT a pretty thorough defeat in the vault, and Tech hoped to reverse that, particularly with one of Bowdoin's better vaulters out with an injury. Plagued by the cross winds and inconsistent run ups, MIT once again fell 2nd to Bowdoin, but nevertheless gained 17 points on Lowell.
Coming out of the first three events, MIT had doubled Lowell's score 50 to 25. Two key matchups were getting underway in the Javelin and High Jump. Nikos Michalakis '01, was taking his 201' Javelin mark against a Lowell thrower whose best is 194'. On the other side of the track Mielcarz and Brian Hoying '03, were taking their 6-8 and 6-6 jumping bests against Lowell's 6-8 and 6-4 tandem. In both cases, MIT came out on top. Nikos popped a 204-11 on his first throw to end the suspense and secure the victory. He was accompanied by a 162-3 effort for 4th by his brother Spiros, and a 155-6 personal best by Dakus Gunn '01, for 5th. Mielcarz continued his freshman year undefeated string with a 6-5 1/2 victory, and Hoying supported him for 2nd place, narrowly missing 6-7 1/2 on three very good attempts.
By this time, the 400 Relay was about to get underway to start off the track events. MIT, favored to place 3rd, had made a change in their lineup with the sudden improvement of Kevin Atkinson '02, and the apparent fatigue of Todd Rosenfield '01. The change, while looking okay in practice, exposed premature handoffs on the first two exchanges to slow MIT down considerably for a 44.30 finish. Fortunately, Bowdoin, the favorites, dropped the baton on the first exchange, allowing MIT to score 5 points with their 3rd place finish.
Continuing to receive gifts from Bowdoin, the Steeplechase was a dual between 2 runners from Tufts and 3 from MIT. Bowdoin pulled their runners in favor of the 1500, and Lowell did not have any runners capable of the steeple event. Running season bests, Phil Loiselle '01, and Craig Wildman '03, finished 2nd and 5th with 10:05.87 and 10:29.05 respectively. Sean Nolan '03, continued to struggle since his debut in California three weeks ago, running 10:16.62 for 4th place. Once again, MIT added 16 points to Lowell's 0.
The 1500, the premier event along with the 800, had the best runners from all four schools ready to test the windy conditions. MIT only entered two runners, Sean Montgomery '01, and Chris McGuire '00, because the field was so deep and talented, it looked like it would take a 4:08 or better to place in the top eight. Sean sat in the rear and stayed out of trouble, letting the race develop until the halfway point. After the leaders came through the 800 in 2:13, Sean moved up, causing the pack to run the 3rd 400 in 61. Sean took the lead and picked it up a little as the final 400 was covered in 60, leaving everyone in his dust except for his teammate. Sean and Chris finished 1-2 with 3:59.76 and 4:00.91 respectively.
At this point, MIT had a 60 point lead, and things looked well in hand. However, Lowell had the potential to make up that difference in the 100-800 events if things went their way. In the Shot Put and 400, Lowell made up 36 of those points, putting MIT on alert. Fortunately, the High Hurdles did not go as they expected. Running 1-3 halfway through the race, both Lowell runners hit hurdles, struggling to the line in 7th and 8th place while MIT garnered 15 points. Junius Ho led the effort with a 15.90 performance into the wind for 2nd place. Bluvas and Mielcarz helped the MIT effort with 4th and 6th place finishes respectively.
The Triple Jump presented an opportunity to put Lowell away. Even without the injured Rick Rajter '03, Tech had the potential to finish 1-2-3 for 22 points to Lowell's expected 2-3 points. However, a foul-out by Ho, combined with an unusually bad day by Robbie Gray '02, left MIT with only 13 points to Lowell's 3. Kalpak Kothari remained undefeated in the outdoor season with a 42-11 victory.
After the 100, Lowell had closed to 41 points behind MIT with three of their biggest events to come. The first was the 800. With both Lowell and MIT sporting 1:53 half-milers, and many others listed between 1:56-1:58, the race was built up as a good one. The leaders went out in a conservative 56 first quarter into the strong winds. Montgomery let the others do the work, staying patient in 3rd-5th place on the inside. With 200 to go, Montgomery and the Lowell runner pulled away from the rest of the field, picking up the pace as they went. As the two entered the final straight, Montgomery pulled away with ease, running 1:52.89 for the victory. John Biesiadecki '01, finished with a season best of 1:59.67 for 7th place. Even with the victory Lowell took the event 17-11 to close to 35 points.
In the 400IH, Tony Pelosi '01, was to lead the way for Tech. Also in the race were fellow 56 second long hurdlers from Tufts and Lowell. Tony got out too slowly, forcing him into a catch-up mode. Making up significant ground, and nearly in the position to win, he went with 17 steps to the 8th hurdle instead of 16 to slow him down enough to prevent the victory. Tony did put on a good kick after the last hurdle to finish 2nd, ahead of the Lowell runner in a PR of 56.32. Once again, Bluvas and Mielcarz offered support with 6th and 7th place finishes to give MIT a 12-6 edge over Lowell, and virtually seal the team victory.
To wrap things up, Yuval Mazor '02, bounced back from a dismal 400 with a 23.18 PR in the 200 for 3rd place. McGuire and Ed Keehr '01, finished 1-2 in the 5000 with strong support from Albert Liu '03, and Liyan Guo '01. The final event, the 1600 Relay summed up the whole meet as the foursome of Rosenfield, Matt Lehman '03, Mazor, and Montgomery defeated the Indoor All New England Champions from Lowell with a 3:21.32 performance. Lehman and Montgomery led the way with 49.6 and 49.3 splits respectively.
Next week, MIT will back off a bit on the team intensity, and pursue some top performances in the Vern Cox Invitational at Springfield on Friday night.