SAN ANTONIO - Trinity University Track & Field collected both the women's and men's Southern Collegiate Athletic Conference Track & Field team championships Sunday afternoon to repeat the same feat from the 2021 season.
Day One Recap
The Tiger women improve to seven consecutive conference titles on the program's 15th overall with a total of 192 points followed by Colorado College at 176, then Texas Lutheran University at 112 points.
Trinity's men notched the third SCAC title since 2016 for the 13th overall on an afternoon rally that pushed the Tigers to 225 points in total, followed by TLU at 204, then Colorado College at a distant third with 95 points.
Jordyn White (St. Louis, Mo. / Lutheran North) repeated as SCAC Women's Athlete of the Meet with victories in Saturday's long jump along with Sunday's 100-meter hurdles along with a third-place triple jump while she took part in Friday's 4x100 relay.
The women's triple jump set the tone for championship Sunday as all of the top four spots went to the Tigers for 28 points including White's bronze output. Joy Areola (Tomball, Texas / Rosehill Christian) took another leap forward in the NCAA III standings with a monster personal-best of 11.69 meters to win the conference title and land in the top-20 nationally. Kyra Stafford (Albuquerque, N.M. / Hope Christian) and Madeline Wiestruck (Houston, Texas / Northland Christian) collect the second and fourth spots, both on personal-bests as well.
Justin Johnson (Houston, Texas / Manvel) collected a sweep of the hurdles as he led a 1-2-3 Trinity finish in the 110-meter edition, an event worth 26 points for the Tigers, in a personal-best 15.37 seconds. Jalen Leonce (Allen, Texas / Jesuit Prep) and Kyle Anderson (Cave Creek, Ariz. / Cactus Shadows) completed the Tiger trio in 15.49 and 15.67 seconds, respectively.
Sean Majors (Fredericksburg, Texas / Fredericksburg) took the top of the podium twice on Sunday on a pair of quality runs at 400 meters apiece. The senior collected a 48.11-second solo run before leading-off the 4x400 that ranks 18th in NCAA III at 3:17.46, joined by Johnson, Josue Parra (Niles, Ill. / Mine East) and Ethan Gilmore (Houston, Texas / Lamar).
Ben Whittemore (Georgetown, Texas / Georgetown) led-off Trinity's second-day conference champions finishing 5,000 meters in a personal-best 15:36.33. Tied for the Tiger men's second-best event by points, Whittemore was joined in the top five by Diego Flores (San Antonio, Texas / Great Hearts Monte Vista North) and William Welden (Atlanta, Ga. / Holy Innocents).
The final nail in the coffin for the women's championship came on a silver performance in the 4x400 relay from the quartet of Sealan Ledat (Richardson, Texas / Richardson), Carter Gray (Scottsdale, Ariz. / Notre Dame Prep), Aliya Jackson (Houston, Texas / Shadow Creek) and Taylor Kotfas (Blanco, Texas / Blanco) in a season-best time of 4:03.41 powered by an impressive kick from Kotfas in the final 150 meters.
A quartet of runner-up performances helped to fend off the early push from the Bulldogs, two of which came in the morning session. Johnson preceeded his short hurdles win with a second-place triple jump at a personal-best 13.93 meters while Cooper Tyler (Austin, Texas / Anderson) notched silver in the javelin on a personal-best 52.76-meter heave. Pierce Jackson (Addison, Texas / Dallas Jesuit) backed up the junior with a personal-best 45.05-meter toss of his own to make javelin the men's other 16-point event.
The latter two silver performances for the men came from a pair of Tiger rookies as Will Salony (Dallas, Texas / JJ Pearce) raced within a few strides of a victory in the 1,500 meters in 3:56.10 while BJ Stewart (Shreveport, La. / Woodlawn) collected the second-best 100-meter dash in 10.80-seconds.
Two other double-digit events were led by a pair of bronze performances. Three of the four legs of the runner-up women's 4x400 combined for 11 team points in the 400-meter led by Gray's third-place performance at 59.07 seconds, followed by Jackson in fourth and Kotfas in sixth. Robert Slaybaugh (Missouri City, Texas / Elkins) notched the third spot in the men's discus on a toss of 42.72 meters. Jack Witkow (Port Washington, N.Y. / Paul Schreiber) brought the other four points on a personal-best 41.72-meter throw for fourth.
Up Next
Members of Trinity Track & Field will spend the coming weeks traveling to qualifier meets for potential entries into the 2022 NCAA III Track & Field National Championships, slated for May 26-28 at the SPIRE Institute in Geneva, Ohio.
