Track men 5th, women 7th at GLIACS

Home Sports Track men 5th, women 7th at GLIACS

The Hillsdale men’s and women’s track and field teams competed at Grand Valley State University on Feb. 23 and 24 in the GLIAC conference championships. The men’s team placed fifth and the women’s team took seventh. After the performances this week, the women’s team will send six athletes to compete in the distance medley relay at the NCAA Division II national championships. The men’s team will bring three competitors.

Junior Josh Mirth took first place in the 5000-meter event with a time of 14:47.34, missing the NCAA provisional mark by .25 seconds. Mirth won 10 of the 14.5 points held by Hillsdale on the first day of the meet.

Mirth also smashed the 3000-meter run with a time of 8:20.84, breaking the GLIAC meet record by 12 seconds.

“It was an amazing thing to watch,” head men’s coach Jeff Forino said. “No one could match him.”

After the meet, Mirth was honored with the title of GLIAC Track Athlete of the Week. Conference coaches grant this honor to the athlete that they consider the best in all running events.

Junior Maurice Jones also had a fantastic performance in the 400-meter dash and earned an automatic qualifying mark for nationals. With a time of 47.34 seconds, Jones won first place and set new GLIAC meet and Kelly Family Events Center records. His performance in the 200-meter dash landed him third place and an NCAA provisional time.

Jones said that he attributes his personal success and the success of the team to the training of head women’s coach Andrew Towne, as well as his previous championship experience.

“Our freshman class seemed like a building class,” he said. “We were a good building block for the future. Now we are trying to become a top contender.”

Junior John Banovetz, who will compete in nationals in the weight throw, finished seventh in the shot put.

“This was the first time in 11 years that I walked away and thought, man, we couldn’t have done anything else,” Forino said.

The women’s team was not as cheery.

“The girls competed well,” Towne said. “We just didn’t have enough bodies.”

Despite the team’s smallness, the women’s distance medley relay team, consisting of junior Victoria McCaffrey, senior Erin Benjamin, sophomore Amy Kerst, and freshman Emily Oren, won first place in the meet, running 11:51.57. The team will compete at nationals next week.

Oren, anchor of the relay, also placed fifth in the mile run with a time of 5:02.50. Fellow freshman Danielle Gagne also took fifth in the 200-meter dash, running the event in 25.54 seconds.

Senior Kayla Caldwell, who will compete at the Division II championships, cleared 13 feet and 4 ½ inches, earning third place overall.

The Chargers will compete in the NCAA Division II Championships at Birmingham’s CrossPlex on March 7-9.