Fort Wayne, Indiana - The men's track & field team concluded the two day WHAC Indoor Championships with a fourth place finish. The Saints tallied 88 points and recorded four conference championships and one new school record on the day. Indiana Tech won the meet with 242 points.
The Saints started strong on day two as
Jake Van Tassell would win the 60 meters hurdles in the day's first event. Van Tassell's time of 7.97 eclipsed his previous school record and now positions him in sixth on the NAIA's Performance List. Jake would later place sixth in the 600 meters in a time of 1:23.20. He then was part of the Aquinas 4x400 meter relay that won the event in a time of 3:18.80. Van Tassell teamed up with
Marcus Mitchell,
Keiton Fase, and
Nathan Iacona to hit the national "A" standard.
Iacona would also be a double conference champion as he claimed the victory in the 400 meters. His time of 49.76 bested the field of 34 competitors.
Marcus Mitchell placed third in the 400 meters (50.19), while
Keiton Fase placed seventh in the 200 meters with a time of 22.20.
Aquinas would receive a conference champion performance from
Jaben Bakker in the 1,000 meters. Bakker clocked a time of 2:34.41 to secure the victory. Also scoring points for the Saints in the middle distance events was
Will VanderBor (Mile - 8th - 4:31.15) and
Zander Masten (600 meters - 8th - 1:26.49).
The Saints distance crew would score three individuals in the 3,000 meters.
Ethan Barker (8:51.34),
Brian Langlois (8:51.88) and
Shema Reponse (8:59.06) placed fifth, sixth, and eighth respectively.
Brendan Madej was named Aquinas' Champions of Character representative.
Aquinas will now switch their attention to the NAIA National Championships that will be contested in Gainesville, Florida in two weeks.
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