In the second of two home meets this season the Rock women’s track and field team put on another strong showing in front of their home crowd at the Dave Labor Invitational. The meet was named in honor of the late coach Dave Labor and was hosted by SRU for the fourth time since his passing in 2011.
“Dave was a good friend of mine and a great coach,” SRU head coach John Papa said. “I think it’s important to get his name out there to people who might not have heard of him, because in a couple years there won’t be too many people left here who worked with him.”
Rock athletes earned 33 Pennsylvania State Athletic Conference (PSAC) qualifying marks and seven NCAA provisional qualifying marks all while winning six events.
Junior Sam Taylor won the javelin throw with a season best throw of 48.41 meters. Taylor’s throw currently ranks as the fifth best throw in Division II so far this year and it earned her a PSAC qualifying mark, a mere .09 meters short reaching the NCAA automatic qualifying mark. Taylor also won the long jump event with a PSAC qualifying jump of 1.68 meters.
The high jump event was dominated by the green and white, as junior Ashley West won the event, sophomore Sabrina Anderson took second place, and junior Paige Kassab finished the sweep coming in third. All three women cleared 1.68 meters, good for the PSAC mark, but West and Anderson took the top two places based on misses.
Senior thrower Brittany Christiansen earned her fourth NCAA qualifying mark in the hammer throw on the year with a 51.78 meter first place throw. She also took third place in the shot put with a 12.29 meter throw.
Rounding out the national marks earned by the Rock, freshman Courtney McQuaide and junior Kaitlyn Clark hit the NCAA mark, tying for second place in the pole vault with 3.71 meter clearances. Junior Michaela Kasik and sophomore Megan Matrisciano hit the PSAC mark with clearances of 3.21 meters.
Junior Jasmine Bailey was the fastest of three Rock athletes to hit the PSAC qualifying mark in the 100-meter dash, finishing in second place in 12.14 seconds.
Bailey won the 200-meter dash with a personal best time of 24.7 seconds, just .04 seconds behind the SRU record.
Senior Janine Powis won the 1,500-meter run with a PSAC qualifying time of 4:45.26 and took third place in the 800-meter run with a PSAC time of 2:21.64.
The final event win for the Green and White came courtesy of Evans in the 100-meter hurdles.
Evans (14.43) was followed by freshman Sophie Mazza (15.07) in seventh.
The final PSAC mark of the day came in the 3,000-meter steeplechase where sophomore Kaylee Haberkam finished in third in 12:05.66.
“Some girls will be taking the week off to prepare for the big event and some will do different events, just to make sure they’re ready for the championships,” Papa said. “We know we’ll be in a battle come May in the championships. No matter the outcome we are confident that each of our girls will give it their best and that’s good enough for us.”
