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 When
the 2003 Heptagonal Games Indoor Track & Field
Championships came to a close on Sunday afternoon, it was
the Cornell Big Red celebrating a pair of victories.
Behind a strong showing from their 4x400 relay squad, Coach
Lou Duesing's women's squad won its second straight Indoor
Heps with 114 points. Katy Jay and her Big Red squad
held a nine-point lead over an upstart Yale team entering
the last event of the championship -- the 4x400m relay.
Sophomore Kari Steed got Cornell off to a flying
start on the first leg and then Jessica and Shonda
Brown extended the lead, giving way to Jay who cruised
in the anchor leg, wrapping up the title for the Big
Red.
With Yale leading after the first day and some strong
individual performances on Day Two, the Bulldogs were right
on the Big Red’s heels.
Freshman Joslyn Woodard, who won three events for the
Bulldogs including the double of the 60-and 200-meter
dashes, was named the 2003 Performer of the Meet. In both
events she knocked off Jay, the defending champion in each.
In the 60, Woodard set a new meet record of 7.59 seconds,
besting the old mark of 7.62 seconds,set only last year by
Jay. Woodard also won the long jump on Saturday. Her win in
the 60 meters ended Jay’s hopes of becoming only the
second women ever to be a three-time champion in the event.
Princeton’s Nicole Harrison turned the trick from
1996-98.
The times of 24.47 by Woodard and 24.48 by Jay in the 200
rank sixth and seventh respectively all-time at Heps. Also
scoring for Cornell was freshman Jan Seale, who
finished third in the 60 and Steed, who was fourth in the
200.
Once again however, leading the way for the Bulldogs were
the O’Neill twins. On Saturday, Laura
posted the best 5,000-meter performance in the last 20 years
at the Championships, then in the first running event of the
day on Sunday, Kate set a meet record in the mile run
with a time of 4:45.28.
Then in the 3,000 meter run, it was the O’Neill’s
going back-and-forth in the lead, until Kate pulled away,
grabbing first place from her sister with a time of 9:24.50.
Laura finished second, at 9:26.37 followed by
Princeton’s Emily Kroshus and Cack
Ferrell at 9:36.87 and 9:36.84 respectively. Yale
finished with 99 points.
In the 400 meters, Jay’s time of 55.70 was the ninth
fastest of all-time earning her team 10 points. Also helping
the Big Red cause was Jessica Brown and Steed who finished
second and fourth respectively, as Cornell registered 22
points in the event.
Harvard’s freshman Mary Serakowski notched a
first place finish in the 60-meter hurdles with
Princeton’s Hasina Outtz coming in second.
Cornell again had multiple scorers, with junior Merili
Mosley finishing third and senior Caitlin Ramsey
coming in third.
The Crimson also earned a victory in the 4x800m relay with
the combination of Laura Maludzinski, Megan Moran-Gates,
Beverly Whelan and Samantha Piper finishing with
a time of 8:58.87 and in the triple jump as Helena Ronner
took first place over Brown freshman Brittany
Grovey.
The most notable performance on Saturday came from Princeton
pole vaulter Chelo Canino, who bettered the meet
record by more than four inches, clearing 12-10 1/4.
Harvard finished third with 73 points, followed by Princeton
in fourth with 66 points, Dartmouth in fifth at 51 points,
Brown ended in sixth with 48.5. Columbia had 39 points to
finish in seventh, while Navy’s 22.5 points had them
finish in eighth and Penn’s 13 points rounded out the
field.
In one of the most exciting finishes in Heptagonal Games
history, the Cornell men, needing to stay two places ahead
of Princeton in the final race of the day in order to secure
its first Heps title since 1978, saw sophomore Brian
Eremita forge ahead on the anchor leg of the 4x400m
relay to push the Big Red and snap Princeton’s string
of five straight titles.
“The kids pulled together and they worked so much
harder this year than ever before. They believe in each
other and even though it didn’t go perfectly, they
still ended up in front and that’s stunning”, said
an obviously moved Cornell Coach Nathan Taylor.
The Big Red received contributions from everywhere. Junior
Rahim Wooley and senior Quinton Carew finished
third and fifth respectively in the 60-meter dash, which was
won by Harvard senior Chris Lambert for the second
consecutive year. Junior Mike Nanaszko scored a
third-place finish in the 400 and sophomore Oliver
Tassinari notched a fourth-place finish in the mile run.
Eremita also finished second in the 500-meter run in
addition to his come-from-behind effort in the 4x400.
Dartmouth junior Mustafa Abdur-Rahim was named the
2003 Performer of the Meet after finishing first in the
pentathlon, second in the 60-meter hurdles, running the
third leg of a 4x400m relay team that finished third, and a
sixth-place finish in the long jump. Overall Abdur-Rahim
accounted for 25 of the Big Green’s 60 points.
Penn's Matt Wedge erased former teammate O'Neil
Bryan's meet record in the 60m hurdles, finishing the event
in 7.98 seconds, shaving .03 seconds off Bryan's 2002
time.
Princeton finished in second with 122 points followed by,
Penn (70), Dartmouth (60), Brown (56), Navy (54.5), Columbia
(40), Harvard (34) and Yale rounded out the scoring with 22
points.
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