Many of the student-athletes on The College of Wooster track &
field teams hit their peak performances this weekend, as they
combined for nine all-conference showings and each squad finished
in fifth-place at the North Coast Athletic Conference
Championships, held at Delaware, Ohio.
Both team finishes were drastic improvements from the indoor season, which saw the women take an uncharacteristic seventh-place and the men eighth. This time, Wooster put itself in the top half of the 10-team league, with the women scoring 72.5 points and the senior-dominated men's group totaling 69. Ohio Wesleyan University made it a clean sweep in the team competition.
Ironically, the Scots did not have an individual champion, but they did have six runner-up performances, headlined by freshman high jump specialist Abena Boamah-Acheampong and senior multi-event standout KateLynn Riley. Boamah-Acheampong cleared the bar at 5 feet, 5 inches, which broke a school record and was a provisional-qualifying mark for the NCAA Div. III Championships. Riley came in second in two events, sprinting her way to a 15.80 time in the 110-meter hurdles and throwing the javelin 114 feet, 6 inches.
Whitney Rappole also gave Wooster a runner-up nod in a hurdle event when she covered the 400 in 1:08.52, while the lone team member to score in three individual events was Veronique Jones, who posted a sixth in the shot put (35 feet, 7.25 inches) and eighths in the discus (94 feet, 11 inches) and hammer throw (79 feet, 3 inches).
Additional multiple scorers were Sarah Appleton and Miriam Wise. Appleton narrowly missed out on an all-NCAC certificate with a fourth-place run in the grueling 10,000 meters (41:08.60) and added a fifth in the 3000-meter steeplechase (12:20.98), an event which saw teammate Erin Plews-Ogan cross fourth (12:01.74). Wise, meanwhile, reached fourth- in the long jump (15 feet, 11 inches) and sixth-place in the triple jump (32 feet, 8.5 inches).
Rounding out the Scot women scorers were Kelsie Herring, who came in sixth in the 800 meters (2:22.28), Melanie Sidman, who threw sixth in the javelin (90 feet, 5 inches) after competing in the NCAC heptathlon last weekend, Stephanie McShane, who sprinted to seventh in the 100 meters (13.22), and Elizabeth Wardop, who tied for seventh in the high jump (4 feet, 7.5 inches).
All-conference performances recorded by the Wooster men included Julian Mangano, Eric Dyer, Bryan Albani, and Robert McConnell, all four being seniors. Mangano nearly defended his championship in the 800 meters, narrowly edged at the line as his time of 1:55.66 was good for second-place, just 0.14 behind first. Dyer was the runner-up in the triple jump (44 feet, 1.5 inches), while Albani produced the seventh and eighth all-NCAC honors of his career by cruising to third among highly-competitive fields in the 110 hurdles (14.94) and 400 hurdles (54.61). McConnell got over 13 feet, 1.5 inches in the pole vault, resulting in third-place for that event.
A series of other Scots just missed all-conference status, with Jon Mathis earning fourth in a couple of events that require different skills – the discus (135 feet, 5 inches) and high jump (5 feet, 10.75 inches) – as well as Josh Kime heaving the shot put 47 feet, 1.75 inches for fourth-place, and Rik Workman grinding out a fourth in the 10,000 meters (33:19.60).
Additional individual point producers were Ramses Clements, who placed sixth overall in the triple jump (42 feet, 4.25 inches), Dyer, who added a seventh in the long jump (21 feet, 4.25 inches), and Sean Twining, who ended up seventh in the high jump (5 feet, 7 inches).