UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. – Senior standout
Zach Michon picked up where he left off, opening his final indoor season with a pair of IC4A-qualifying performances to lead the Saint Joseph's men's track and field squad at the unscored Nittany Lion Challenge, held at Penn State's Ashenfelter III Indoor Track on Saturday afternoon. The Hawks qualified for the IC4A Indoor Track and Field Championships in both the mile and 4x800m relay.
In his season debut, Michon ran the second-fastest open mile of the day, crossing in an IC4A-qualifying time of 4:11.82 for silver in the 25-member field. The senior edged out Penn State's Ben Baumgarner and Army's Keagan Smith for the runner-up finish, falling to Georgetown's Tristan Forsythe by just over a second. Michon becomes SJU's first IC4A individual qualifier on the season.
Michon also ran the second leg of the first-place 4x800m relay, as junior
Joshua Richard, Michon, and sophomores
George Steinhoff and
Michael Szwed crossed in an IC4A-qualifying time of 7:52.46; the Hawks' 4x800m relay time set last time out at the Ocean Breeze Athletic Complex back at the start of December (7:49.99) will remain their seed time.
Szwed also placed ninth in a field of 20 in his first collegiate 600m (1:21.42 PR).
The Hawks also put together their fastest 4x400m relay of the season up to this point, as sophomore
Michael Welde, freshman
Ladi Bamgbose, senior
Justin Moscoe, and sophomore
Kyle Magee crossed in 3:20.91.
Individually, Welde (49.49) and Moscoe (49.73) went third and fourth, respectively, in the 400m field of 11 while Bamgbose turned in SJU's top 60m time, going for 7.23 in the preliminaries for 13th overall in his collegiate debut in the event.
Also finishing as SJU's top performers in their respective individual events, sophomore
Aidan Sauer went fourth (field of 10) in the 800m (1:56.70), senior
Christian Roberts (2:30.71 PR) and sophomore
Zach Smith (2:30.89 PR) went ninth and 10th, respectively, in the 1000m field of 17, junior
Bobby Hastie placed seventh in the 3000m field of 11 (8:43.11), and junior
Sebastian Eaton ran the 13th-fastest 200m (22.70) in a field of 19.
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BETHLEHEM, Pa. – Sophomore
Michael Baumgarten and junior
Vincent Giordano each turned in a pair of scoring performances to lead the Saint Joseph's men's track and field squad to a fifth-place team finish in a field of six at the Angry Birds Challenge, held at Lehigh's Rauch Fieldhouse on Saturday afternoon. The Hawks totaled 23 points on the day.
Baumgarten won his 200m heat en route to a sixth-place finish in a field of 25, crossing in 23.39 for four points.
He also went on to run the second leg of the second-place 4x400m relay that included sophomore
Ryan Dao, senior
Harrison Morris, and sophomore
Harrison Antone; the group crossed in 3:36.80 for five points in the field of 11.
Giordano totaled six points with a fifth-place finish in a field of 14 long jumpers (21' 6" PR) and a ninth-place finish in a 60m field of 18 (7.20).
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Saint Joseph's returns to Lehigh's Rauch Fieldhouse next Saturday, January 18 for the Moravian Invitational.
