The Lions responded well to performing at home as two school records were broken while the College hosted its first invitational of the season on April 10. Senior Steve Liccketto dominated his events, placing third in the men’s discus, second in shot put, and broke the school record in the hammer with a distance of 52.82 meters.
Also breaking a record was freshman Steven D’Auitolo who took first in the triple jump with a distance of 13.79 meters.
“I felt good going into the meet, not too sore or anything from practice earlier that week,” Liccketto said. “I would like to keep improving through the season not just to set the bar higher, but to achieve a higher qualifier for nationals.”
The meet also had many first place finishes. The Lions began by sweeping both the women’s 200-meter dash and the women’s 100-meter hurdle races. Juniors Tiffany Etheredge and freshmen Kayla Ghanavati and Kim Shelus and in the 200-meter as well as senior Priscilla Senyah, freshman Brielle Doremus and senior Meghan Miller in the 100 meter took first, second, and third respectively. Ghanavati took first in the 400-meter dash with a time of 1:02.99 and was a part of the winning 4x400 relay team.
Junior Rochelle Prevard and sophomore Emma Tucci joined Ghanavati and Shelus to take first with a combined time of 4:07.59. Tucci continued her success by out-throwing the competition in the javelin with a distance of 35.91 meters. Junior Sarah Wehrhan took first in the hammer with 43.49 meters, and junior Miriam Khan sprinted to first in the 100-meter dash in only 12.32 seconds. Finally, Sophomore Katie Nestor stayed ahead of the pack in the 1,500-meters, finishing strong with a time of 4:48.24.
The women weren’t the only ones with massive success. The men’s team dominated their side of the invitational as well. Junior Kyle Gilroy took
top honors twice in the 110-meter and 400-meter dash with times of 14.95 and 54.88 seconds respectively. But it was the men’s relay teams that shone the brightest. In the 4x100, the quartet of Gilroy, sophomores Rob Jiggetts and Christopher Medina, and freshman anchor Kyle Magliaro sprinted to first in 42.27.
Not far behind was the second team of grad students Rob McGowan and Steven Murray, senior DeShard Stevens and sophomore anchor Justin Worthing with a time of 43.52. Worthing also combined with Gilroy, Murray and Medina to take the top spot in the 4x400 relay with a speedy time of 3:21.85. The second team of Stevens, McGowan, Magliaro and freshman Robert Searby placed second in 3:26.29.
“The relay was the most exciting race,” Jiggetts said. “It’s different when you don’t know your competitors or how fast they are. There was a lot of trash talking between the teams but it was positive because we pushed each other.”
On the individual level, Jiggetts continued his success with two second place finishes in the 100 and 200-meter dash with impressive times of 10.98 and 22.15 respectively. McGowan narrowly edged out Worthing in the 400-meters. His time of 50.39 was just .02 seconds faster than Worthing.
Junior T.J. Bocchino endured the 3,000-meter race and was rewarded with a third place finish in 8:48.92. Not too far behind him was junior Rob Nihen with 8:52.31. Shawn Rembecky and sophomore Kevin Burns tied for second in the high jump, clearing 1.89 meters. Junior Tim Blashford continued his successful season by clearing 4.42m in the pole vault, earning a second place finish.
“We all put in a lot of hard work,” Jiggetts said. “This track is where we train rain or shine, and everyone was so excited to have a home meet to show everyone what we could do.”
The Lions have a busy schedule ahead of them. This weekend they will travel to Moravian College for the Greyhound Invitational and Princeton University for the Larry Ellis International.
