Shippensburg University men’s outdoor track almost broke several school records, and the women’s squad set a number of personal records to highlight the team’s Friday performance at the Colonia Relays from The College of William & Mary.
For the men, senior Peter Gelston won the 3000-meter steeplechase finishing one-tenth of a second shy of the school record with a time of 9:03.76. The run marked a 11-second improvement over his season best, and ranks him in the Top 5 on the Division II performance list.
Senior Eric Bologa grabbed a third-place finish in the 400-meter hurdles with a time of 52.65 seconds, 0.48 seconds shy of Mark Piccolo’s school record.
Senior LeQuan Chapman finished third in the championship portion of the long jump with a mark of 23-feet, 8 3/4 inches.
The combination of Chapman, Bologa and Gelston leads PSAC play in their respective events.
Senior Andrew Kujawski finished third in the 400-meters with a time of 48.63 seconds; he now leads the league in the event. Senior Robert Bales competed in the same heat, finishing in a PSAC qualifying time of 49.49 seconds.
Sophomore Kieran Sutton grabbed the top spot in all of PSAC play with a 5K collegiate-best time of 14:38.45 that is less than a second short of an NCAA provisional qualifying time.
For the women, several sophomores highlighted Friday’s action, including Sarah Hunt in the long jump and Casey Norton in the 3K.
Hunt notched her first career 19-foot outdoor long jump, becoming the 12th DII competitor to hit the mark this season and moving into the top spot in PSAC.
Norton won the 3K with a time of 10:21.44 in her first collegiate appearance in the event, beating opponents from schools such as Pitt, Bucknell and Rutgers.
Senior Bri Fells maintained her lead in the PSAC with a 400-meter time of 57.68, and junior Megan Lundy finished in 58.95 in the same event.
Freshman Hannah Fulton posted a conference-qualifying time of 18:31.72 in the 5K, good for a second-place finish. She became the second Raider to qualify in the conference for the event.
Senior April Schlusser earned a league qualification in the 1,500 meters with a time of 4:52.09, and sophomore Erika Huffman posted a five-second PR with a time of 4:52.44 in the same event.
On Saturday the team competed again in several relay, throwing and jumping events.
Seniors Robert Bales, Eric Bologa and Andrew Kujawski and sophomore Tim Usher finished a close second in the 4x400 with a time of 3:17.12. The four also competed in the sprint medley relay, placing seventh with a time of 3:29.52.
Senior LeQuan Chapman landed a PSAC-leading mark of 47 feet, 2 1/2 inches in his season debut in the triple jump.
For the women, senior Liz Smith broke her own school record in shot put with a toss of 44 feet, 3 1/4 inches.
Several other throwers had huge days for Shippensburg, including redshirt-freshman Tamara Ovejera in the discus and freshman Crystal Hartman in javelin.
Ovejera won her event with a throw of 143 feet, 1 inch in a PSAC-qualifying performance, and Hartman won her event as well with a season-best 143-foot, 5-inch effort.
The Raiders return to action next Thursday at Kutztown, taking on the Golden Bears at the Mondschein Multis.
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