Second place is not always as bad as it sounds.
While the men's track team was not able to overtake Penn in its quest for a Heptagonals championship, the Tigers did rally from a 25-point deficit over four events.
The entire meet came down to the last event, the 4x400 meter relay. Penn's win in that race, with Princeton finishing second, decided the top two teams in the championship.
The Princeton team of freshman Mike Kopp, Junior Jon Karakoulakis, sophomore Josh Kauke and senior Ryan Smith finished in three minutes, 11.73 seconds. That time put them just 1.36 seconds behind the Quaker team that took the title.
Smith also won the individual title in the 800-meter race, finishing with a time of 1:49.00. He finished second in the same event at last year's outdoor Heps.
And then there was Tora Harris.
The senior high jumper not only set the national collegiate high mark in his specialty event, clearing seven feet, seven inches, his performance was also good enough to make him the second-ranked jumper in the world.
It was also the highest jump by an American this year. Only one other American, Matt Hemmingway, has cleared 7-6.5 this season, along with two international jumpers who have also cleared that height.
Harris' jump was also a meet record, breaking Harris' own previous record of 7-5.25, which he set last year.
The current NCAA record is 7-9.25, set in 1989 by Hollis Conway from Southern Louisiana University.
The Tigers had a number of other top three finishers at the meet.
Sophomore Jeff Key finished second in the 400 m with a time of 53.02; Key's classmate Tristan Colangelo claimed second in the steeplechase, in a time of 8:56.86.
Additionally, the 4x100 relay team of freshmen Dwaine Banton and Solomon Barnett, sophomore Adrian Mullings and junior Austin Webb finished third in their event. Their time for the race was 41.19.
Princeton also managed to place in the top ten in some of the individual field events. Freshman Paul Lyons, for example, finished eighth in the discus with a throw of 152-5.
With all of the inividual success the Tigers enjoyed at Heps, including Harris' world-class jumps, maybe second place does not seem all that bad after all.
2002 Outdoor Heptagonal Championships Final Standings
1. Penn 131 2. Princeton 129 3. Harvard 98 4. Cornell 69 5. Dartmouth 59 6. Navy 56 7. Brown 29 8. Columbia 26 9. Yale 23Read More
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