Jumbos garner second place at Div IIIs

There was no trophy to hoist at the end of the day, but the women's track and field team left the New England Div. III Championships at MIT with heads held high. The Jumbos (133.50 points) placed second overall behind defending champ Williams (154), giving the Ephs a scare in the process. Amherst (60) was a distant third.

"It basically came down to the last two events," coach Kristen Morwick said. "We messed with them, they weren't expecting us to even be close. We had a phenomenal day. We had four facility records [in the 3000, the 600, the 4x400 relay and the 800] and one meet record [in the 800]."

Senior quad-captain Jess Trombly led the way with two individual wins. Trombly edged WPI's Lindsay Bulso by 0.02 seconds with a career-best of 8.44 seconds in the 55-meter hurdles. Trombly also slipped on her distance shoes and danced around the track in the 800m to beat Colby's Jessica Minty by a tenth of a second, finishing with a national provisional time of 2:15.58, her third national event of the season.

"[Bulso] from WPI ran a hell of a race but Jess nipped her at the line," Morwick said. "Both [of Trombly's] races were tough to win."

Fellow senior quad-captain Emily Bersin led three scoring Jumbos in the 600m, winning the event in a personal-best of 1:38.80, 1.5 seconds clear of the pack. Freshmen Kate Makai (1:41.04) and Raquel Abrams (1:41.77) also scored in the tight field, finishing fourth and sixth respectively, with just 1.81 seconds separating second through eighth place.

Sophomore Rachel Bloom scored points in both the 200m (26.38 seconds) and 400m (PR of 58.79), finishing third and second respectively. Bloom logged the sixth Jumbo national qualifying entry this season with a provisional mark in the 400m, missing first place by just a tenth of a second.

Senior quad-captain Lauren Caputo sacrificed a chance to qualify nationally in the 5000m and instead ran for the team in the 3000m -- an event not featured nationally. The move paid off, with the cross-country star winning the event with a nine-second PR of 10:11.69.

"It was a great race. It went out really fast but I was able to stay in the top five," Caputo said. "I slowly caught up to the first girl and beat her on the last lap, so it was pretty exciting. It was a good way to win."

Tufts also received big points in the pentathlon, with all three Jumbo competitors scoring with PR's. Sophomore Megan Sears led the field with 3050 points, a 250-point career-best, while junior Melissa Graveley (2809 points) finished third and sophomore Daniela Fairchild fourth with 2743.

"[The pentathlon] was phenomenal," Morwick said. "Megan Sears' score is on par with a national qualifier in the heptathlon outdoors, close to what Jess Trombly did in that event last year [finishing third nationally]. We scored 21 points in that event. That was huge."

The nation's top Div. III 4x400m team of Trombly, Bersin, Bloom and junior Sika Henry did not chase the Tufts record they set last weekend but got the job done, beating Williams by almost two seconds in 3:59.56.

"We weren't trying [for the Tufts record] at all, everyone had already run other events [and was tired]," Henry said. "The 4x400 is just so much fun, we're doing really well at it this year, to be able to not run your best and still easily win [says something]."

Henry also tied Colby's Emilie Coulson for third in high jump with a 5-03.75 foot leap, clearing the same height as the first and second-place finishers, but losing out based on an earlier missed attempt at a lower height.

"We all had jumped the same height, but because I had that one miss [at a lower height] they placed me third," Henry said. "It was just a matter of luck."

Williams and Tufts split hairs in many of the track events. Williams won just two track events, the 1500-and 4x200m relay, but consistently placed amongst the race leaders in most other races to score 88 points, while Tufts scored 114. But the Ephs made up the difference in the field, outscoring Tufts 66 to 19.5.

Williams claimed second and third in pole vault, an event uncontested by Tufts, and took first, second and fourth in the triple jump. Jumbo senior Shushanna Mignott countered Williams with a third in long jump (PR of 17-02.25) and a sixth in triple jump (34-07.50), while Trombly added a fourth in long jump (16-11.00). Four of Williams' six shot putters scored, however, and one Eph placed in the weight throw, earning Williams an unchallenged 16 throwing points.

"[Mignott] was behind the board on that one, it was a bomb. She really let one go," Morwick said of Mignott's long jump. "But it's tough to score in the throwing events. We had people throw PR's, but Williams is loaded and Bates' [Liz Wanless and Kelly Godsey, one-two finishers in both shot and weight throw] are just phenomenal."

Other highlights included freshman Sarah Crispin's second place finish in the 1000 with a career-best 3:02.91. Sophomore Rebecca Ades (18:28.15) qualified for All-New England's with a sixth place in the 5000m, while senior Lauren Dunn (18:44.03) finished eighth in the event.

"We chipped away at [Williams]. I had us being maybe within 40 points of them. To be 20 points, if one event had gone wrong for them, it would have been right down to the wire," Morwick said. "I'm really proud of this group. We don't get the studs coming in like Williams does, but somehow these kids, I don't know, it was just cool to watch. It was a team effort."