After competing at the Western Athletic Conference Championships, the Southern Utah University men’s track and field earned the top spot for the indoor season. The women’s team placed fifth, a spot higher than their sixth-place finish last year.
Men’s
The men had top-10 finishers in the majority of events. Starting off with the pole vault, Trenton Maurer tied for sixth with his 16-1 3/4 performance. The long jump saw three Southern Utah athletes in the top four, with Cedar English in first at 25 1/2, Astley Davis in second at 24-3 3/4 and Levi Smith in fourth with 23-9 1/2.
The mile run was also Thunderbird-ridden. Isaiah Labra took the No. 1 spot with a scorching time of four minutes and .25 seconds. Santiago Gaitan came in third with 4:06.29, Hayden Howard finished fourth with 4:10.11 and Lanse Larsen ended in sixth with 4:12.43.
Three of the top-five finishers in the 400-meter were from SUU. Jaedyn Carpenter led the Thunderbird flock in second place after running 46.68 seconds, followed by Gibson in third at 46.76 and Nelson Douglas in fifth at 46.98.
Nathan Carlin was the only Southern Utah athlete in the men’s 800-meter final, where he placed seventh with a time of 1:54.2.
Gibson and Carpenter raced in the 200, placing first and third at 21.08 and 21.21 seconds, respectively.
The 5,000 featured Travis Feeny, Coleman Cragun, Max Jones and Jacob Peterson, all with top-10 finishes.
The men’s first event on the second day of competition was the high jump. Joren McKeever took second overall after jumping 6-8 3/4. Jarom Smith tied for fourth at 6-6 3/4 and English tied for sixth at 6-4 3/4.
Astley Davis followed with a second-place finish in the triple jump with a distance of 52-6 3/4.
Daniel Krynzel took fifth in the shot put event, throwing 51-11 3/4.
Half of the top 10 athletes in the 3,000 wore SUU red. Feeny, Labra and Gaitan held all three podium spots, while Cragun and Jones finished fifth and ninth.
The final men’s event was the 1,600 relay, where Gibson, Douglas, Carpenter and Noah Bringhurst finished in second place after their 3:08.99 run, just .03 seconds behind Grand Canyon University.
Women’s
Makenna Skoczylas was the Thunderbirds’ first impressive finish at the meet with her third-place finish on the pole vault. She vaulted 12-4 3/4.
Rebecca Hazelet followed Skoczylas in the women’s weight throw, tossing 53-11 to earn 10th.
The mile run saw Madisan DeBos take third after running 4:56.11 and Jordyn Bartolomucci take sixth with a time of 5:01.79. Southern Utah had another podium finisher in the 60-meter hurdles in Savannah Nielson, who took second with a time of 8.48.
In the 800, Josii Johnson ran 2:11.16 for the second-place spot, while Kimberly Winward ran 2:17.44 to earn seventh.
Secret Mceuen earned seventh in the 200 after finishing in 24.47 seconds. The 5,000 followed, where Sariah Hernandez took fourth and Quinn Hagerman took 10th.
As the sole No. 1 finisher for the women’s team, Ajia Hughes won the high jump with her 5-10 3/4 leap. Hazelet came next in the shot put event, throwing 37-8 and coming in 10th place.
DeBos and Hernandez were the final solo competitors for SUU, placing fifth and seventh in the 3,000, both with finishes just above 10 minutes.
Next up
With qualifiers on both teams, the Thunderbirds will head to the NCAA DI Indoor National competition. They have until March 8 to prepare for their trip to Boston.
Author: Anden Garfield
Photo courtesy of SUU Athletics
sports@suunews.net
