Complete Results
Thursday Recap
NEW YORK - For the first time since 2008 and the 38th time in program history, the Manhattan College men's track & field team won the Metropolitan Indoor Championship on Friday at the New Balance Armory Track & Field Center. It came down to the final event--the 4x400 meter relay--before the Jaspers clinched the team title by a mere 2.5 points over Rutgers. The Manhattan women, meanwhile, finished sixth as a team.
Manhattan's quartet of Josh Perez (Marlton, N.J.), Mikael Rojeras (Sala, Sweden), Greg Perrier (Dix Hills, N.Y.) and Kevin D'Emic (Rockaway Point, N.Y.) won the 4x800 meter relay in a time of 7:45.53, giving the Jaspers the lead in the team standings with one event to go. However, Manhattan didn't have a team entered in the 4x400, meaning Rutgers could take the title with a first- or second-place finish. The Scarlet Knights ended up fifth in the event, though, clinching the team title for Manhattan.
In addition to the 4x800 squad, which qualified for the IC4A Championships, the Jaspers' effort was bolstered by several solid individual performances. Approximately 90 minutes after winning the mile in 4:15.47, Rojeras returned to the track for the 800 meters. He won that event also, clocking a 1:52.22 (the top time in the IC4A so far this season) to lead a 1-2 finish for the Jaspers. Perrier captured second place in 1:52.91. Both times were IC4A qualifiers. D'Emic also had an IC4A-qualifying effort in the 1000 meters. He finished second in a time of 2:27.66
Tom Bechert (Munich, Germany), who won the pole vault at Draddy Gymnasium on Thursday, added another event victory in the long jump after leaping 6.90 meters (22 feet, 7¾ inches). He also qualified for the IC4A Championships in another individual event, placing second in the 60 meter hurdles (8.17). In addition, Bechert grabbed fourth place in the high jump, clearing 1.97 m (6'5½). He single-handedly accounted for 33 team points in the four events.
Felix Siljeback-Larsen (Vasteras, Sweden) held a 50-point lead in the heptathlon after the first day, and he extended that margin by winning the first two events of day two-the 60 meter hurdles and shot put. Siljeback-Larsen ended up with 5238 points, nearly 400 more than the second-place finisher.
Manhattan also boasted a few ECAC Championships qualifiers on the women's side. Emmy Koskinen (Sodertalje, Sweden) won the 800 meters in 2:13.75, while Cara Rostant's (Valley Stream, N.Y.) time of 56.92 seconds in the 400 meters was good enough for fourth place. Koskinen later joined with Elizabeth Rosenberger (Ramsey, N.J.), Janie Turek (Mt. Sinai, N.Y.) and Milena Stoicev (Nis, Serbia) in the 4x800 meter relay. The Jaspers captured third place in an ECAC-qualifying time of 9:23.57.
Stoicev just missed the ECAC standard in the 1000 meters. She finished fifth in a time of 2:57.81. In the 60 meter hurdles, Doreen Horschig (Lumpzig, Germany) registered an 8.97-second clocking to capture third place. Andrea Nyback (Koping, Sweden), meanwhile, was fourth in the long jump (5.67 m, 18'7¼) and fifth in the high jump (1.55 m, 5'1).
The Jaspers earned 64 team points in the women's competition. Columbia collected 172 points for the team title.
Manhattan will be back at the New Balance Armory Track & Field Center next weekend for the Armory Collegiate Invitational. The meet begins at 9:30 a.m. on Friday and concludes on Saturday.
