The Point Park men’s and women’s track teams continued to make history this past weekend. Both placed second of 15 teams on Friday night at the Baldwin Wallace mid-February meet in Berea, Ohio.
Despite the meet taking place on Friday the 13th, it was a good day for the teams, who competed in 18 events each and had a total of 24 placements (14 for men, and 10 for the women).
On the men’s side, Point Park made noise, scoring five first place victories at the fifth meet in the history of the program. The Pioneers had never won a men’s event before Friday. Allegheny College won the team title with 87.50 points. Point Park fell short with 82.50 points. Westminster College (Pa.) was third with 73 points.
A notable performance came from star Falonte Jackson, a freshman sprinter from Cleveland, who had his first collegiate wins in the 55-meter and 200-meter dashes with times of 6.54 seconds and 22.75 seconds, respectively.
Zachary Watt, a freshman sprinter, also from Ohio, won the 500-meter run with a time of 1:09.37. Watt now owns the school record for the 500-meter run, according to the University’s Athletics website.
In the jumping events, Point Park had two first place victories. Freshman Jryi Davis won the event in the triple scoring at 13.31 meters. Shaun Berry followed Davis in the event coming in second. Berry tied for first in the high jump with Rio Johnson of Notre Dame (Ohio) jumping at 1.93 meters.
The women’s 4×200 relay team that consisted of Amber Brown, Taelor Fowler, Chereese Langley and Jahniah McAllister ran the event for the second time and won again. Langley said she plans to work hard throughout the week and continue striving for greatness.
“I just want to continue to stay dedicated and keep working hard during the week, and I know it will show at the next meet,” Langley said.
Fowler felt confident before taking off in the 4×200 meter race.
“I kind of knew that we were probably going to win the 4×200 because the other three runners are great runners,” Fowler said. “I was excited and happy but in a way I just knew that we were going to win.”
Fowler set a school record placing second in the 55-meter dash with a time of 7.60 seconds.
Distance runner Katie Guarnaccia had the first individual win for the women’s team in the mile run with a time of 5:31.83. Guarnaccia also competed in the 3,000 meter run coming in second place with a time of 11:08.58.
The Pioneers’ next meet will be at Kent State University in Ohio this Saturday. This will be the last regular meet of the indoor season and the teams’ last chance to have qualifiers for the National Association of Intercollegiate Association (NAIA) Indoor National Championship meet.
