The St. Thomas men’s and women’s teams competed in the third and final day of competition at the Summit League Outdoor Track and Field Championships Saturday at O’Shaughnessy Stadium.
The Tommies scored in 20 events Saturday and medaled in five, including the men’s triple jump, women’s 4×100-meter relay, men’s 110-meter hurdles, men’s 200-meter dash and men’s 4×400-meter relay. The men’s team finished in fourth with 112 points and the women’s team finished in fifth with 71 points..
“We won a lot of close battles, we competed in so many events that we were not predicted to,” men’s coach Pete Wareham said.
Junior Isaiah Hopf won the men’s triple jump with the 76th best jump in all of Division I this year, 15.21 meters. In between jumps, Hopf left to run the 200, running a personal record and taking fifth.
“Everyone wants people like that. He’s a huge talent, he’s one of the more talented guys on the team. He’s valuable in a lot of places,” Wareham said.
For Wareham, the way Hopf won was just as important as the victory.
“He came back and passed people and was able to win it. We had that elsewhere throughout the meet, but he did it to win,” Wareham said.
Joining Hopf in the 200 was sophomore Mitchell Piehl, who took third place in the 200 and fourth place in the 400.
Hopf and Piehl were also a part of the 4×100 team that set a new school record of 40.7 seconds.
“The best thing I heard just a few minutes ago was a kid from another school recognize Mitch Piehl on our team and Jack Rosner. This kid approached me and said, ‘Those guys are tough competitors,’ and I just loved hearing that,” Wareham said.
The men’s 4×400 relay team took third after South Dakota and Oral Roberts were disqualified for impeding. The four runners were seniors Calvin Bream and John Morrisson and sophomores Thomas Dundon and Cameron Heppner.
Rosner also took to the podium after placing third in the 110 hurdles, running within 0.02 seconds of the school record he set on Friday.
Wareham took a second when thinking about how he was going to address his seniors after the meet.
“I’ve been thinking about that a lot and to be honest, I don’t know,” Wareham said. “Because I don’t know if I can really say how grateful I am and have them really truly understand how grateful I am.
Wareham had a message for the underclassmen and rising seniors for next season.
“I think that if they follow the lead of those that have gone before them, we’ll be in a great place,” Wareham said.
The women’s team only medaled in the 4×100 relay but put more competitors in the finals and scored more points than ever before in the Division I era. The team consisted of sophomores Alexis Pratt and Cassia Cady, senior Taynian Walgrave and first-year Rebecca Randleman.
“Utterly a huge, massive team effort to get where we are today. So, I couldn’t honestly be prouder of all the women,” women’s coach Ashley Lucas said.
Pratt came close to the podium in the 100 and 200, taking fourth and setting a PR in both.
“She just keeps getting better and better,” Lucas said. “She’s still got two more years left, so for her to just kind of gain that confidence year in, year out, it’s going to be huge for her. She’ll just get stronger and faster for years to come.”
The championship signaled the end of the career of the seniors who heralded in the transition to Division I from Division III.
“I’ve always told them, ‘Do what you can to leave a legacy and leave the program better than when you got here.’ I think they did that just through their leadership skills, through buying into the vision of the program,” Lucas said.
Lucas said that the team’s achievements can only grow.
“We are coming … next year we might not be vying for that conference title, but I think we definitely turned some heads and in the few years to come, it’s definitely a possibility,” Lucas said.
Along with those who medaled on Saturday, three others made it to the podium.
Rosner and senior Nate Raddatz took second and third in the decathlon, and graduate student Anna Swanson won the women’s javelin.
Adam Mueller can be reached at muel7541@stthomas.edu.
Kevin Lynch can be reached at lync1832@stthomas.edu.