Further building toward a successful season, the men’s track and field team boasted two successful performances at its most recent meets. For these meets, the team was split in two. A small number of athletes headed for Boston University’s John Thomas Invitational on Jan. 31, while most of the ...
The women's track and field team split its squad up over the weekend for a pair of non-scoring meets. A few members of the team traveled to Boston University's annualJohn Thomas Terrier Invitational on Friday, while the majority of the team competed at Tufts' own Stampede Invitational, ...
Tufts notched 141 points this weekend, placing first out of eight teams at the Bowdoin Invitational, 17 points ahead of runner-up Southern Maine (124) and nearly 30 points ahead of host Bowdoin, who finished in third with 111.33 points. The biggest takeaway for the weekend, however, was neither the ...
The women's track and field team traveled through the snowstorm to Brunswick, Maine on Saturday for the Bowdoin Invitational.Traditionally, this meet has been the smallest competition for the Jumbos during the indoor season, with numbers as low as four teams.However, this year was different with ...
The men's track and field team started its new season strong at home with a third place finish in the Tufts Winter Invitational. The event, held in Gantcher Center, featured 14 teams. Div. II teams from UMass Lowell (160) and Stonehill (145) finished first and second, respectively, while Tufts ...
The women's track and field team returns to the oval this Saturday for the first Tufts Invitational of the season held at the Gantcher Center. Tufts lost important athletes to study abroad this semester, so the team will be missing many key players in its winter and spring seasons. Nevertheless, coach ...
Women's BasketballCurrently in the midst of a seven-game winning streak to begin the season, the team is coming off an 88-48 thrashing of Fitchburg State, besting its season-high point total by 10 points. The team will take on Bridgewater State tomorrow at 7 p.m. before going on an extended ...
On Saturday, members of the women's cross country team traveled west to Stanley Park in Westfield, MA for the annual ECAC Div. III Championship. Since the ECAC meet takes place the week before the NCAA Div. III Regional meet, most of the top squads rest most, if not all, of their top seven, and ...
The men's cross country team begins its postseason on Saturday with the NESCAC Championship meet at Middlebury College. As a traditionally tough conference, the NESCAC includes some serious competition for Tufts in teams like Middlebury, Amherst, Williams, Bates and Colby. Senior Joe Poupard ...
On Saturday, the women's cross country team traveled a few miles down the road to Boston's historic Franklin Park for the annual New England Intercollegiate Amateur Athletic Association (NEICAAA) Championships, also known as Open New Englands. The Jumbos put themselves to the test against ...
The men's cross country team enters the 2014 season in pursuit of its fourth straight trip to the NCAA Championship meet. If all goes according to plan, the Jumbo runners will send a squad to Mason, Ohio on Nov. 24 to once again stake Tufts' claim as a competitive cross country program on the national level.
Women's track and field, represented by a small group of competitors, inaugurated the spring semester with a trek to Hanover, N.H., on Jan. 12 for the Dartmouth Relays. Despite the particularly small Tufts representation, the team powered to a seventh place finish among 14 schools.
The reigning Div. III New England indoor track champions returned to the oval at Springfield College last weekend looking to defend their championship. Strong pushes from Williams and MIT, however, were just too much for Tufts. The Jumbos ended up in third place at the championship meet.
The women's track and field team, which won the NESCAC Championships at home last year with a dominating 203-point victory over second-place Middlebury (117.50 points), was unable to repeat, as Williams outpaced the field Saturday with a crushing 179-point score. Tufts was second with 126 points, while Middlebury finished third with 109.5 points. While the rain at Colby College certainly played a role in many athletes' individual performances, the Jumbos were still able to have an impressive day all around, putting up a fight against Williams. Sophomore Alexis Harrison took third overall in the 100-meter dash with a time of 12.44 seconds, falling just short of her season-best time of 12.29 seconds. Senior tri-captain Anya Kaufmann took fifth in the event, running a time of 12.60 seconds to add four more points to the Jumbos' score. Kaufmann nabbed an eighth-place finish in the 200-meter dash (26.45 seconds) to add another point to the score. Senior Jana Hieber added 20 points to the Jumbos' total score with two individual NESCAC titles including wins in the 100-meter and 400-meter hurdles. Her dominating time of 1:02:70 in the 400-meter hurdles was over a second faster than the second-place time. The Jumbos were also victorious in the 4x100-meter relay, as junior Christina Harvey, Kaufmann, freshman Bianca Rescalvo and Harrison teamed up to break the meet record with a time of 48.06 seconds. The previous meet record was set last year by Harvey, Kaufmann, Harrison and Samantha Bissonnette (LA '13) in 48.27 seconds. "The 4x100 [relay] really got people psyched for the rest of the day," sophomore Sydney Smith said. "It pumped us up and made us hungrier for points." Tufts also fared well in the distance events. In a fast 800-meter race, Smith and junior Lauren Gormer both placed in the top eight. The race was extremely tight, with first and fifth place separated only by 1.5 seconds. Smith came in fifth with a new personal record of 2:15.99, while Gormer placed seventh with a season-best time of 2:17.04. In the 5,000, sophomore Audrey Gould ran out to the front from the gun and never looked back. Following a 5:30 first mile, Gould was able to take the NESCAC title with her time of 17:30.26, finishing more than six seconds ahead of the next closest runner. The Jumbos also saw points scored in the 10,000, as senior Abby Barker placed fifth, running a time of 36:57.44, while senior Lauren Creath took eighth with a time of 37:36.12. In a similar fashion, senior tri-captain Laura Peterson and sophomore Olivia Beltrani also finished in the top eight in the 3,000-meter steeplechase. Peterson took fifth, running a time of 11:21.11 in the competition, while Beltrani took eighth in a new personal record of 11:33.54. "I wanted to go out hard in the steeplechase to avoid racing with the pack over the water jumps, and after that, I just wanted to hang on," Peterson said. Although Tufts was not as dominant in the field as it was last year, the team still competed at a high level. Hieber took second in the long jump with her leap of 17' 8", while Harrison and Kaufmann finished sixth and eighth, respectively. Tufts also received three top-eight finishes in the shot-put as senior Robin Armstrong took fifth with a throw of 36' 3 1/2", Hieber took seventh with a toss of 35' 8 1/2" and freshman Bailey Conner made her mark with an impressive throw of 35' 5 1/4" to place eighth. Armstrong later placed fifth in the hammer throw with a heave of 142' 5", and sixth in the javelin with her throw of 124' 10". Senior Kristen Roberts and sophomore Paige Roberts also contributed to the point total as well in the high jump, as Kristen Roberts took fifth with a mark of 4' 11 3/4", while Paige Roberts tied for sixth, achieving the same height, but with an additional attempt. "Williams was an incredibly talented team that was going to be very difficult to top," Smith said. "We had a lot of great performances, but we also had a few areas where we fell short of what we were hoping to achieve." Williams has won the NESCAC title 13 times since 2001, but Peterson still believes that Tufts can catch the reigning champs next year. "We may be losing a lot of seniors and Williams is an incredible program, but I think if the underclassmen continue to improve and keep doing what they are doing, then we could beat Williams," she said. "We also need to be able to capitalize on [Williams'] mistakes." Though the most important part of the season is over, Smith said that the team still has more work to do. "Our team focus moving forward will be on chasing a few school records, improving personal performances and hopefully qualifying plenty of people for Nationals," she said. "We will be looking for a solid finish at the Div. III New England meet next weekend [at Springfield College], but we most likely won't have our full squad due to finals."
After a strong showing at the New England Div. III Indoor Track and Field Championships, the women's track and field team started the outdoor season in similar style, winning the annual Snowflake Classic hosted at Tufts, beating out 23 other teams in the process.
Although most of coach Kristen Morwick's squad had the day off, some members of the women's track and field team traveled five miles down the road to the Boston University Track and Tennis Center for the New England Intercollegiate Amateur Athletic Association (NEICAAA) championships, also known as Open New Englands. "Only a select few run at this meet because it has the hardest qualifying standards," sophomore Hanako Shigenobu said. "At this point, everyone's goal was to compete well and improve on marks to qualify for Nationals." The distance squad was the most represented Tufts group at the two-day meet, as a slew of Jumbos set season-best times. The distance medley relay (DMR) quartet of Shigenobu (1,200-3:41 split), senior Jana Hieber (400-56.2 sec- ond split), junior Lauren Gormer (800- 2:16 split) and sophomore Audrey Gould (1,600-5:10 split) was able to place 10th overall, running a time of 12:05.46 for a season-best mark. This time was a 0.13 second improvement over their DMR time from the Cupid Invitational two weeks ago and puts them nationally at No. 19, down from their previous No. 9 ranking, as other teams have moved past them in the standings. "Our goal was to qualify for Nationals in the DMR, but unfortunately, we did not run well," Shigenobu said. "We were ninth nationally coming into the meet and only 12 are invited, but we were bumped out of the top 12 after this meet." Senior tri-captain Laura Peterson was able to achieve a personal best in the mile by over five seconds, as she ran a time of 5:04.18 to take 15th overall in a tightly bunched finish that saw the top eight finishers cross the line within five seconds of each other. "Individually, I wanted to run a faster mile time than my times over the previous weeks and race the heat," Peterson said. "As a team, we did not have many entries, but all of us competed well." ??In the 3,000-meter run, sophomore Olivia Beltrani ran herself under the 10 minute barrier, posting a national No. 18 time and new personal record (PR) of 9:55.03. Only the top 17 in the nation get an automatic bid to compete at Div. III Nationals, placing Beltrani right on the bubble. "We definitely improved from where we were before, but we will be looking to improve our relay teams," Peterson said of the team's performance. "We have more athletes in the hunt to qualify [for Nationals]." The Jumbos also had a successful day in the sprints. Sophomore Marilyn Allen set a new personal best of 9.09 seconds in the 60-meter hurdles preliminary round, good enough to advance to the semifinals. She bowed out of the competition by placing 13th in the semifinals, though, running a 9.21 second time. Senior tri-captain Anya Kaufmann com- peted in the 60-meter dash with a time of 8.00 in the preliminary round. Senior Colleen Flanagan also raced well, placing third in her heat of the 500-meter dash by running 1:21.33 seconds, equivalent to a 1:42.48 600-meter time. Perhaps the most impressive sprint- ing performance on the day, however, came not from any one team member but from four athletes collectively. In the 4x400 relay, the team of junior Lauren Gormer, Allen, freshman Rita Donohue and Hieber placed second in its heat behind Sacred Heart University, running a time of 3:54.83, making them the 16th fastest 4x400 team in the nation. "At ECACs, our 4x400 team will be looking to run an even faster time than they did this weekend, since they are on the bubble for qualifying for nationals," Peterson said. Although most of the field event athletes had the day off from competition, one still competed in the meet. Freshman pole vaulter Keren Hendel crossed the bar at 11' 5 3/4" en route to a 10th place finish. Hendel's mark was a new PR by 10 centimeters, and it places her nationally at No. 32 for the event. The Jumbos will next compete at their own Last Chance Meet, held at the Gantcher center on Thursday, where they will hope to either end the season on a strong note, or, for those preparing for the Div. III Nationals, to improve on their seed marks. Athletes who cannot qualify at Last Chance will travel to Roxbury's Reggie Lewis Track and Athletic Center for the Eastern College Athletic Conference (ECAC) Championship meet on Saturday to take another shot at earn- ing a qualifying mark. "I'll be running the DMR on Thursday, and we'll be looking to run a strategic and fast race to qualify," Peterson said. "Many of our distance runners will also be looking to qualify in their event, so it is really important that we are on our game this weekend."
Although senior Jana Hieber did not compete on the same day as her nationally-ranked No. 23 team, she was still able to lead it to an impressive second place finish behind No. 2 MIT at the annual Tufts Stampede Invitational.
The women's track and field team entered the weekend hoping to qualify runners for postseason meets, and they did not disappoint.
