The Slippery Rock women’s track and field team hosted its first of two home track meets this past weekend. The team was led by strong performances from seniors Jasmine Bailey and Kennedy Evans who each won two events. Bailey and Evans also ran legs for the 4×100-meter relay with senior Erica Hans and freshman Emily Hortsman to win in 48.57 seconds.
Bailey won the 100-meter dash in a time of 12.33 as well as the 200-meter dash with a time of 25.22, with freshman Emily Hortsman behind her in third, running 25.88 seconds. In the 100-meter hurdles, Kennedy Evans led the way with a winning time of 14.42 with senior Jenna Bracken behind her in second with a time of 15.02 and junior Sophia Mazza in sixth with a time of 15.26 seconds. Evans also won the 400-meter hurdles in a time of 1:01.13, with junior Katie Teed following in 1:07.20. Finishing the sprinting events, Hortsman, Hans and Teed joined freshman Courtney Nunley to run a 4×400-meter time of 4:16.09 to secure the win.
In the distance events, senior Melissa Rains ran a time of 2:25.68 to place second in the 800-meter run while junior Caitlyn Janeda ran to a second-place finish in the 1500-meter run with a time of 4:59.67, with sophomore Madison Przcicina in seventh, running a time of 5:13.16. Makaila Banka ran 19:52.54 in the 5000-meter to finish up the distance events.
The Rock had a strong showing in the field events with freshman Madeline Marshall winning the pole vault clearing 3.45 meters, with junior Maria Darling and senior Megan Matrisciano both in third with a vault of 3.31 meters. Junior Anna Frengel and senior Kelci Yale took second and third in the shot put with throws of 12.42 and 11.76 meters, respectively. Freshman Abby Way threw 34.06 meters to take sixth in the discus threw and freshman Emily Cropper took fifth in the javelin throw with a toss of 33.88-meters.
“It is a bit early. However, we do have some great performances even this early in the season,” head coach John Papa said about the team’s performance. “We need to focus on being consistent, we need to perform well regardless of the weather. You never know what kind of weather we will have at the PSAC (Pennsylvania State Athletic Conference) Championships.”
Most The Rock will compete at the PSAC West Invite at Indiana University (Pa.) this weekend, with a few athletes traveling to Lynchburg Virginia for the Liberty University Multi on Friday and Saturday.
“Many of the best athletes in the PSAC will be in attendance at the IUP meet. There should be great competition in all of the events,” Papa said. “The Rock will only send a few heptathletes to the Liberty meet. “Liberty should be a great opportunity for our multi-event competitors. Since there are not many multi-event competitions available, we need to travel to get good competition in the multi-events.”
