Tigers notch dominating victory at HYP

Both the men’s and women’s track and field teams demonstrated their superiority over fierce Ivy League rivals Harvard and Yale by dominating in the H-Y-P meet which was hosted in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Both teams built on their performances at the Sykes & Sabock Challenge Cup to easily outdistance Harvard and Yale and seemed to be in a different class compared to their opponents, with the men’s team totaling 125 points, which was more than double the combined points scored by Harvard (36) and Yale (22). The women’s team also steamrolled their opponents, albeit in a less dominant fashion, finishing with 87 points, easily beating Harvard (54) and Yale (41).

Men’s Track and Field

This was the 24th straight H-Y-P title for the men’s track and field team and with this performance, it seems that this streak will continue for a long time, especially if the team continues to perform in such a way.

The performance at H-Y-P was so dominant that in the 60m dash, Princeton took the first five spots. Freshman Carrington Akosa finished first with an impressive time of 6.88, only just edging out juniors John Hill (6.89) and Dre Nelson (6.90) as well as senior Tommaso Greenbaum (6.94) and fellow freshman Maxwell Schwegman (7.01).

Akosa’s day was not finished there, as he brought home two other first place finishes in the 200m and the 4x400 relay events, rounding out a remarkable performance. Sophomore Brent Albertson came second in a closely contested 200m race, whilst Schwegman came in fourth place. Rounding off the spring events was junior Greg Caldwell’s breaking of his personal record in the 60m hurdles as he clocked in at 8.00, beating teammate and senior Rob Mohr by 0.08 seconds.

Not only did the men’s team dominate the sprints, but they were also in fine form in the mid-distance events as freshman Eric Schulz won the 500m with a time of 1:04.82 and freshman Josh Ingalls came in third. Other victories came from senior Bradley Paternostro in the 800m run, a 1-2 victory in the mile run for freshman Garrett O’Toole and junior Sam Berger and another relay victory in the 4x800 as the team of O’Toole, Patternostro, freshman Noah Kauppila and junior Luke Brahm finished with a time of 7:40.21.

The field events brought similar success as junior Jake Scinto got two victoriesby winning the long jump (7.20m) and high jump (2.02m). Princeton completed a 1-2-3 finish in both events as sophomore Greg Leeper and senior Tumi Akinlawon came second and third in the long jump, while sophomore Xavier Bledsoe and freshman Colin Reilly rounded off the podium in the high jump.

Senior Adam Bragg continued his fine form as he followed up on his record breaking weekend with another victory in the pole vault, recording a 5.20m while sophomore Ben Gaylord finished third, some 0.3m behind Bragg. Freshman Lane Russell rounded off a clean sweep of the jump events as he won the triple jump with a 15.44m mark as senior Nana Owusu-Nyantekyi came third with 14.73m.

Sophomore Christopher Cook claimed the final victory for the Men’s team as he dominated the shot put event, beating his personal record in an 18.34m toss with teammates senior Scott Rushton and freshman Mitchel Charles claiming second and third, respectively.

Women’s Track & Field

The women’s team claimed their fifth victory in six years, and although they were not as dominant as the men’s team, they were clearly superior to Harvard and Yale.

The women’s team was in great form during the sprints and mid-distance runs as they won the 400m, 500m, 800m, the mile run and the 3000m events. Sophomore Katie Hanss won the mile run by less than half a secondwith a time of 4:49.29. Junior Jasmine Blocker took first in the 400m event with a time of 55.72 as freshman Quinn Parker joined her on the podium with a third place finish (58.56). Similar finishes occurred in the 500m and 800m events as junior Meghan McMullin came first in the 500m and sophomore Elisa Steele finished third, while junior Cecilia Barowski finished first in the 800m, six seconds ahead of third place finisher senior Kim Mackay. The 3000m event brought more success for the team, as sophomore Megan Curham and junior Kathryn Fluehr combined for a 1-2 finish.

The relay teams sadly both just missed out on finishing first as the 4x400m event provided second to fourth place finishes for Princeton A, B and C teams, with the Princeton B teamlosing to the Harvard A team by a little bit more than one second. The 4x800m team was even unluckier as they lost by milliseconds to the Yale team with a time of 9:00.78.

The field events brought similar success to the women’s team as there were victories in the weight throw, pole vault, high jump and long jump. Junior Julia Ratcliffe took first in the weight throw with an impressive distance of 19.90m, beating her runner-up by over 3m. Sophomore Allison Harris won the pole vault event, clearing a 3.85m mark as teammate and fellow sophomore Lauren Santi came third with a 3.30m mark. Junior Inka Busack won the high jump with a mark of 1.73m whilst fellow junior Taylor Morgan was only a few centimeters behind at 1.65m and claimed third place.

Rounding off the victories was junior Sara Ronde as she won the long jump with a mark of 5.59m while teammate Kerry Krause finished with 5.30m. Sophomore Alexandra Lanzafame only just lost out on the triple jump title, recording a 11.57m jump whilst the eventual winner from Harvard had a jump of 11.70m.

Both teams will continue to look to build on their success this past weekend as they host the Princeton Invitational this coming Sunday at Jadwin Gym. The events will begin at 11 a.m.