Bucknell University Athletics
Bucknell University
Patriot League Championships
Champions at Last: Bucknell Men's Track & Field Captures Patriot League Title!
5/1/2010 8:00:00 AM | Men's Track and Field
May 1, 2010
LEWISBURG, Pa. - On what Bucknell coach Kevin Donner called the best day of his coaching career, senior Kyle Anthony, sophomores Robert Arent and Andrew Powell, and a host of other heroes helped the Bison men's track and field team finish its climb back to the top of the Patriot League mountain. Competing on their home track under warm, sunny skies, the Bison men edged Army by a mere three points to claim their first outdoor title since 1991.
With the Bucknell women also winning the outdoor championship on Saturday to complete their 2009-10 "Triple Crown," Donner was emotional after the Bison sweep. "To win two championships on the same day is something special," said Donner, who was named both the men's and women's Coach of the Meet. "On the men's side, it has been a very long time, and we have been talking about this day for so many years. We have often come up just a little short, especially at indoors this year. This is an outstanding achievement for our men. It was a total team effort, and I am just so proud of our guys."
Anthony (Barryville, N.Y./Eldred Central) stamped an exclamation point on a brilliant career Saturday by adding the triple jump title to his gold medal in the long jump a day earlier. Anthony, who was named the Field Athlete of the Meet at the end of the day, had been pushing 50 feet in the triple jump his entire career but was just a quarter-inch short. On Saturday be blew past that barrier, jumping 50 feet, 6 ¼ inches to win the event for the second straight year. He is only the second 50-foot triple jumper in school history, joining Bill Gravely, who set the school record with a leap of 50-11 ¾ in 1976.
Bucknell entered the day with a 10-point lead over Navy and a 12-point cushion over Army. Just as it was about to be announced that the Black Knights would pick up 18 points with a 2-3-4 run in the shot put, the Bison grabbed those 18 points right back at the conclusion of the decathlon. Powell (Charlton, Mass./St. John's) won the event with 6,336 points, and senior Thomas Vogler (Oneonta, N.Y./Oneonta) just snuck into second place by two points over Lehigh's Kyle Forrest with a strong kick in the final event, the 1,500 meters.
Powell became Bucknell's first-ever Patriot League champion in the decathlon, and he turned this into quite a year, winning championships and earning all-conference honors in two different sports. Powell was a Second Team All-Patriot League pick on Bucknell's title-winning men's soccer team in the fall.
The performance of Powell and Vogler was all the more important considering teammate Ryan White (Elkins Park, Pa./Father Judge), a senior and one of the favorites in the event, was injured during the meet and did not finish. White was the league champion in the indoor heptathlon this winter.
Bucknell's workhorse of the meet was Arent (New Providence, N.J./New Providence), whose final-day performance has to go down as one of the best in program history. In a span of less than two hours, Arent finished third in the 110-meter high hurdles and won both the 400-meter dash and the 400-meter intermediate hurdles. And if that wasn't enough, he returned in the final event of the day to anchor the 4x400 relay that clinched the meet with a second-place finish.
Arent, who was named the Patriot League Track Athlete of the Meet, became the first athlete in league history to win both the open 400 and the 400 hurdles in the same meet.
In the 110 hurdles, senior Andrew Yehl (Elizabethtown, Pa./Elizabethtown) earned the silver medal while breaking his own school record with a time of 14.33 seconds. His previous record was 14.36 set in 2008. Arent was third in 14.45, also a PR and the third-fastest performance in school history. Sophomore Dan Mularz (Manalapan, N.J./Freehold Township) was sixth in 15.05.
The men's 400 began only about a half-hour after the high hurdles, and Arent came from behind to outlean Army's Michael Hutchins by .03 seconds. Arent's time of 48.12 was the fifth-fastest in school history. Junior John Picardo (Rochester, N.Y./Hilton Central) scored valuable fourth-place points in the 400 with a time of 49.11.
The 400 hurdles was a huge point-producer for Bucknell, as Arent and Mularz finished 1-2. Arent outraced the field with a time of 52.80, while Mularz ran a personal-best 53.30, the fifth-fastest time in program history. Arent already ranks No. 3 on the Bucknell list in that event.
With three events left in the meet, Bucknell held a seven-point lead over Army. The Black Knights closed the deficit to five in the 200-meter dash, when Alfred McDaniel nosed out Bucknell freshman Justin Hicks (Wilmington, Del./Tower Hill School) for third place.
The second-to-last event was the 5,000 meters, but neither Bucknell nor Army scored in that event, meaning it all came down to the final event, the 4x400 relay. Army was considered one of the favorites, meaning if the Black Knights won, Bucknell would need to finish second or third to claim the title. An Army win and a Bucknell fourth-place finish would give the Black Knights a one-point victory.
Mularz got the Bison off to a good start, and quickly, Army, Navy and Bucknell separated from the pack. All the Bison would need were clean passes, and when Arent crossed the line in second place just over a second behind Army, it set off a massive celebration in the Christy Mathewson-Memorial Stadium infield.
Lost in the jubilation was the fact that Arent, Mularz, Picardo and Jordan Donaldson (Saxton, Pa./Tussey Mountain) ran the second-fastest time (3:13.66) in program history. Bucknell's only other sub-3:14 4x400 relay came all the way back in 1975, and it was anchored by Hall of Famer Tom McLean, who was an NCAA champion in the 800 meters the following year.
It was by far the closest outdoor championship meet in league history. Bucknell finished with 181 points to Army's 178. Navy was third with 105, followed by Lafayette with 89, Lehigh with 72, American with 37, Colgate with 16 and Holy Cross with 4.
In a three-point win, every points counts, and the Bison scored in all but one event on the final day.
In the 100-meter dash, Isaih Bell (10.89) and Hicks (11.08) finished third and fourth, respectively. Andrew Huebner (Hampton Falls, N.H./Governor Dummer Academy) was runner-up in the 3,000-meter steeplechase in a time of 9.13.9, while freshman Nicholas Blodis (Moon Township, Pa./Sewickly Academy) scored with a sixth-place finish in 9.25.3.
Christopher Boyd (Gaithersburg, Md./Thomas S. Whooton) was third in the 1,500 meters in 3:53.01, and in the 800 meters Donaldson picked up two big points with a strong run in the next-to-last section. Donaldson won his heat in 1:52.32, and that proved to be the fifth-fastest time in the event.
In the 4x100-meter relay, Yehl, Hicks, Bell and Thomas McGarrigle (Malvern, Pa./Malvern Prep) finished third in 41.37. That is the second-fastest time in program history in the 4x100 and just four-hundredths of a second off the school record set nine years ago.
In the field events, Powell backed up his decathlon win with a silver medal in the high jump. Powell was one of five athletes to clear 6-6 ¼, but based on fewest misses the title went to American's Zach Wright. Bucknell's Drew Fitzgerald (Ballston Spa, Pa./Ballston Spa) was sixth in the high jump at 6-4 ¼.
Two Bison freshmen scored in the discus throw. Leonard Joseph (Whitesboro, N.Y./Clinton) was third with a fling of 150 feet, 5 inches, while Luke Webster (Pataskala, Ohio/Newark Catholic) took sixth at 148-8. In the shot put, sophomore Tom Barr (Ambler, Pa./La Salle College HS) finished fifth (51-10) and freshman Quinten Marcott (Wayland, Mich./Wayland) was sixth (51-5 ¾). Marcott's mark was a personal best and tied for seventh-best in program history. Barr already owns the No. 4 spot on Bucknell's all-time list.
The day began with a ceremony dedicating the new Christy Mathewson-Memorial Stadium javelin runway. Senior manager of athletics fundraising Tom Harvey presided over the dedication, and he and Donner provided words of appreciation for those that made the runway project possible: Beynon Sports Surfaces, Inc., Chris Van Saders '84, Steve Pierce '10 and family, Zachary Shapiro '11 and family, and Kat Folger '12 and family.
The Bucknell teams christened the new runway with outstanding performances on Friday. Pierce and Ted Heitzman went 1-2 in the men's javelin event, while Laura Rycek and Folger finished 2-3 in the women's competition.
This marks the first sweep of the men and women's track and field championship since Army last accomplished the feat in 1998. It is Bucknell's second sweep as a Patriot League member, as they first did it back in 1991, the Patriot League's inaugural year.
Later this month, the Bison will be back in action at the IC4A Championship and the NCAA Regionals.
