Panthers refuse to feel homesick

The men’s and women’s track and field teams haven’t let competing away from campus all year… The men’s and women’s track and field teams haven’t let competing away from campus all year ruin their seasons.

Because of Pitt’s lack of a proper facility, the Panthers never compete at home but have still have managed to be successful in recent years. Last year, the women won the Big East title, while the men have steadily improved since head coach Alonzo Webb took over.

This season it has been more of the same, and that continued last weekend as a select group of Panthers were invited to Lynchburg, Va., to participate in the Liberty Asics Collegiate Invitational.

The men’s team sent three student-athletes to compete, and all were successful. Eric Jones, Dartel McRae and Charles Sneed competed in several jumping and multi-events at the meet.

The highlight for the men’s squad was the first-place finish of Jones in the triple jump. Jones, a freshman who graduated from nearby Gateway High School, has been strong all outdoor season in the triple jump. This weekend he took first with a personal-best mark of 14.37 meters, while he finished second in the event at the Raleigh Relays the weekend before. He still holds one of the top marks in the conference.

Sneed, also a freshman, set a personal best in the triple jump this weekend as well with his mark of 13.20 meters which was good enough for eighth place at the meet.

The personal bests kept coming as Jones placed 13th with a career high in the long jump at 6.24 meters and Sneed took sixth in the high jump at a career mark of 1.87 meters.

Both Sneed and Jones competed in the 100 meters, the first sprinting event of their collegiate careers and finished 16th and 23rd respectively. McRae, a transfer from Seton Hall, competed in his decathlon and finished ninth.

“I was really happy with the performance on the men’s side for the weekend,” Webb said. “We’re hurting for depth, but the guys we do have, have really stepped up.”

While the women’s team has had more depth overall on the season, at the invitational-only, one event was extremely successful for Pitt.

That highlight for the women’s squad came in the heptathlon event.

The heptathlon is a two-day event consisting of seven different events – the first day is made up of the 100-meter hurdles, the high jump, the shot put, and the 200 meters; the second day consists of the long jump, javelin throw, and finally the 800-meter race.

All three Panther participants in the heptathlon earned personal bests at the invitation.

Mycah Clemons led the way by placing third with a score of 4,658, a score good enough for top five on the season in the Big East, while Joelle Ambrose placed seventh with 4,371 points.

Freshman Kristin Johnson, who was competing in the event for the first time in her career, placed 14th with 2,757 points.

“After a meet like this, it’s hard not to walk away with a good feeling,” Webb said.

“We finished third for the indoor season, and I think we’re actually a better outdoor team than we are indoors because of the additional field events. So right now things are looking good as the women try to defend their conference title.”

“It’s hard to tell right now where we are as far as the Big East is concerned, but after our next meet we should really know where we stack up.”

That next meet will be the Texas Relays that will start today and go through Saturday.