Swift senior Jen Jezorski set a new Bulls indoor track and field record in her one-mile run last weekend at the Sykes-Sabock Challenge Cup hosted by Penn State University.
Despite low overall team scoring, Jezorski had individual success. Jezorski placed second in the one-mile event and supplanted Christine Keck's 2003 Bulls record time by crossing the line at 4:50.20.
Keck's record was 4:51.00.
Women's head coach Vicki Mitchell made it clear Jezorski was adamant about achieving this record, despite the stiff competition.
"(Jen) ran a really strong race. She really set the tone early," Mitchell said. "The girl that won, Maureen McCandless, from Pittsburgh, is an All-American. Jen's goal going into the race was to break the school record and she was very successful in doing that."
As a team, both the men's and women's teams placed 10th competing inside the Horace Ashenfelter III indoor Multi-Sport Facility in University Park, Penn.
The men also had individual standout performances, most notably that of senior Roy Richards. Richards was the only Bull to win an event at the meet, taking the men's long jump crown with a leap of 7.36 meters. Richards' win edged out Kent State junior I.P. Harris' second-place jump of 7.34 meters.
Mitchell said that Richards' winning results were of no surprise.
"Roy has been incredibly consistent," Mitchell said. "Today's win was his second or third win in the long jump event this year."
Senior Dan McKenna finished third overall at 4:11.43 in the men's one-mile run. McKenna completed the race behind a pair of freshmen from Michigan. Victor Gras finished in a blistering time of 4:07.63 and Lex Williams came in just behind Gras with a time of 4:08.11. Despite McKenna's third-place finish, he was left unfulfilled.
"Dan was disappointed that he didn't have a faster time," Mitchell said. "But, the two guys from Michigan that beat him are also incredible competitors."
The Bulls team of junior Brian Heim, junior Paul Riley, junior Babasey Olaleye and senior Bryan Weinstein also placed eighth in the 4x400-meter relay event, as they exchanged batons to finish overall at 3:19.24.
On the women's side, other solid performances were put in by a myriad of runners, jumpers and throwers.
Freshman Caitlin Godin placed fourth in the women's high jump event. Godin's jump of 1.70 meters was not enough however, as junior Natalie Sako of Akron out-jumped the pack at 1.81 meters.
In the 800-meter run, junior Kate Kohout raced into fifth place with a time of 2:11.79, a few seconds behind first-place finisher senior Jennie Castle of Akron, who finished in 2:07.03.
The team of Kohout, freshman Desiree Rudloff, freshman Mary Veith and junior Jessica O'Neil also raced to a fifth-place finish in the women's distance medley. The team crossed the line at 11:50.64.
Sophomore Tina Villa's toss of 13.69 meter in the shot put garnered her a fifth-place standing as well.
Mitchell said that her team can take a lot away from this meet, as the team competed against many of the top Midwest and Mid-Atlantic teams, and a few Mid-American Conference teams.
"It was a very competitive competition," Mitchell said. "Overall, there were a lot of strong teams, like Cornell and Penn State, to name a few. We also got to see key MAC competition that we'll see again in two weeks in the conference tournament. So, we can review our performance and see what we can improve on."
Penn State showed domination at home taking first place in both the men's and women's overall team scoring. On the men's side, the Nittany Lions finished first overall with 125 points, followed by Michigan with 117.5 and Cornell with 72.5. The Bulls finished 10th with 25 points overall.
For the women, Penn State won with 111 points with MAC foes Akron and Eastern Michigan rounding out the top three. The women's squad accumulated 31 points in their 10th place finish.
The men's and women's indoor track and field squads travel to the Akron Invitational on Friday Feb. 17 in Akron, Ohio. The Bulls are likely to rest some of their athletes in preparation for MAC Championship on Feb. 24-25 hosted by Bowling Green.
