The Plattsburgh State track and field team and field team finished of its regular season meets with another great performance, this time at the Pioneer Invitational in Utica.
It was a weekend of program records and ECAC qualifiers for the team, and head coach Nicholas Jones was quite satisfied with his team’s effort.
“We had some great performances. It was one of our best meets so far this year,” Jones said. “It was good momentum to be going into our championships this weekend with.”
On the women’s side, senior Stephanie Boucher was at it again, this time breaking the Cardinals’ program record time in the 1000 meters with a time of 2:55.55, en route to earning her fourth SUNYAC Women’s Indoor Track and Field Track Athlete of the Week honor.
The standout, though, had to be junior Courtney Wilson.
Wilson leapt to an ECAC qualifier with her 2nd place finish in the triple jump, while also getting 4th in the long jump, 9th in the 200 meter dash. She also made up one fourth of the team that won the 4×200 relay while qualifying for ECAC and setting a new program record of 1:47.08 (also running the 4×200 were freshmen Elisabeth and Claire Deshaies, and junior Ashlee Estes).
Wilson was ecstatic with her own performance, as well as the team’s.
“The team did really well, everyone went out and tried their hardest,” Wilson said. “Starting off the day with the school record (in the 4×200) obviously felt good, and then as the day went on I felt the enthusiasm for the other events, and got more and more excited.”
There was even a bit of a local connection when it came to the women’s 4×200 team, with all 4 runners coming from the Plattsburgh area.
Jones was particularly proud of this accomplishment.
“All those girls are from Section 7, they’re all local girls,” Jones said. “They’ll all be back for next year, and that relay time is now in the top five in the ECAC, so they did a great job.”
Plympton also had two ECAC qualifying times of her own, finishing 2nd in the 60 meters, and 3rd in the 200 meters.
The men’s side saw a little less reason to celebrate, but still had a good weekend of its own.
The men’s 4×200 relay team also had a successful weekend, with the group of senior Kyle Jones, sophomore Brian Fabian, junior Sobaan Ayub and senior Eric Denny running an ECAC
qualifying time of 1:30.93. Denny had some individual success as well, finishing third and getting an ECAC qualifier in the long jump, with a 6.67 meter mark.
Ayub was proud of his team’s and his own performance.
“I felt pretty good about my performance,” Ayub said. “We ran 1:30.93 in the 4×200, which is less than a second off of the school record that we were hoping to get, but it still puts us second in the ECAC.”
Other strong performances from the men included an 8th place finish in the triple jump by senior Sean Baker, Jones grabbing 3rd place in the 200 meter, Ayub finishing fifth in the 400 meters, and junior Stephen Schnalzer running and 8th place finish in the 800 meters.
Now, with its regular season at an end, PSUC gears up for its championship meets, starting this weekend with SUNYACs.
Both Wilson and Ayub were confident that they, and their team, would be ready.
“We’ve been focusing our hardest and working together as a team this week,” Ayub said. “Everybody is super motivated and excited to do their best this weekend.”
Wilson agreed.
“We’re focusing on individual stuff this week, more often,” Wilson said. “We’re getting prepared and honing in on what we’re really good at, so we can bring it into this meet.”
The Cards’ next meet will be the SUNYAC championships this Saturday and Sunday, hosted by Brockport.
“We had a lot of really good performances last weekend that bumped us up in the SUNYAC standings coming into this weekend,” Jones said. “We’ll see some good performances.”
Email Ben Watson at sports@cardinalpointsonline.com
