Tufts 2nd at Division III New Englands

(2/19/2005) See more Photos     Full Results

After a tightly-contested day of competition, the Jumbos fell to Williams college, 123-108.5 at the New England Division III Championships held at the Gantcher Center. Behind the Jumbos? second place finish, Bates was third with 77 points and MIT placed fourth with 67 points.

On Friday, in the pentathlon, Tufts was represented by first year Jeremy Arak who finished in fifth place with a personal best score of 3073. He recorded a personal best in all five events, and won the high jump with an impressive leap of 6-05. His performance put him in third place on the all time performance list here at Tufts.

Competition on Saturday was highlighted by sophomore long/triple jumper Fred Jones, winning both the long and triple jumps for 20 points. Even more impressive was his NCAA provisional-qualifying long jump of 7.24 meters, just 2 centimeters off the NCAA automatic standard, and placing him second in the nation among Division III athletes. In the vertical jumps, Arak cleared 1.91m (6-3.25) to tie for third place in the high jump, while junior Seth LaPierre cleared 4.42m (14-6) to place third in the pole vault.

The sprints served as the Jumbo?s Achilles heel, as they were outscored by Williams 34-0 in the 55, 200, and 400. Freshman Marcus Boggis turned in a strong performance in the 55m dash (6.76) but missed the finals by a paltry .03 seconds. Williams? John Symanski turned in an NCAA-provisional qualifying mark (6.44) to take the victory. Symanski won the 200 as well (22.06).

In the middle distance events, Sophomore Nate Cleveland ran a season-best 1:23.37 for fifth place in the 600, while junior Pat Mahoney turned in a strong performance in the 800m run for second place (1:55.61). Aaron Kaye set the tone with a victory in the 1000 (2:31.60), despite not running in the seeded heat. Matt Fortin contributed a point in the 1000 (2:34.75), coming back from a three-point effort in a very strong 1500 won by Keene State?s All-American Dave Bridgewater in 3:56.47.

In the longer distance events, senior Nate Brigham and sophomore Josh Kennedy combined to go 1-2 in the 5000 meter run for 18 points, running 14:59.12 and 15:10.31, respectively.

Going in to the relays, Tufts was down 102-91.5, but a victory by Kaye, Dustin Virgilio, Mahoney and senior Brian McNamara in the DMR (10:22.7) brought the Jumbos within 9.5 points going into the 4x400. The team of Cleveland, Trevor Williams, Andrew Gordetsky and Nate Scott placed third (3:24.53), but a first-place Williams finish clinched the meet for the Ephs.

Qualifying Jumbos will be competing at Boston University next weekend in the All-New England Championships, followed by a "last chance" meet hosted by Trinity and finally the National Championship in Bloomington, IL.

The team would like to say a big thank you to Ben Thayer who took all of the excellent photos for this meet. Great job Ben!


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