Men take first, women second, at OUA track championships
By Michal Tellos
Sports Editor
March 4, 2009
While an eleventh straight OUA title for the men was expected, a second-place finish for the women was an impressive surprise, especially considering the absence of star veteran Hannah Eberhard.
In the words of Head Coach Dennis Fairall, the men’s team was dominant across the board, and they could have vied for first even without Jamie Adjetey-Nelson and Derek Watkins, who scored 33 and 26 points, respectively.
“If you really look at it our men were so dominant, it was great to see. Jamie scored 33 and Derek scored 26. Combined they scored 59 points, but we won by 70. Even without them - not that we would ever want to compete without them - it would have been a very close team battle,” said Fairall.
Nelson won a gold and three silver, even though he did not compete in his signature event of the pentathlon.
He won gold with a nation’s-best jump of 7.43m in the long jump, and additionally won silver in shotput, 60-metre hurdles, and 4 x 200 metre relay.
Watkins, as was expected, placed first in the high jump and the triple jump, also adding a bronze medal in long jump.
Both Nelson and Watkins were nominated by the team for the title of OUA athlete of the meet, which will be announced this week.
Overall, the men’s team scored an impressive 185 points, ahead of second-place Guelph who scored only 115.
Although the absence due to illness of Hannah Eberhard was felt, the women dug deep and fought hard for a second-place finish.
“The women actually performed very well, we could have won it. Unfortunately we were outscored in the 1,000-metre, 1,500-metre, and the 3,000-metre, 55-0. If you look at the team scores, we really have to address those events,” said Fairall.
“Not only did we not perform in those events at all, but also the other teams didn’t help us at all. There were some major scratches from other schools that could have displaced the Guelph runners, and would have pushed them back making it a lot closer and giving us the win. Our kids performed extremely well,” he added.
Those events were the signature events of Hannah Eberhard at last year’s competition, but despite this extreme gap in the competition, the women just finished in second behind Guelph, by a team score of 139.5 to 147.
The women were led by fantastic performances from Noelle Montcalm.
“Noelle Montcalm had a great meet, she had three gold medals. She won the 300-metre in a seasonal best time of 39.40s, and she got the gold medal just 20 minutes later in the 60-metre hurdles. And the day before she won the gold medal in 4 x 200 metre relay,” said Fairall.
Also helping was Raeleen Hunter, who had a gold, a silver, and a bronze medal finish in the 4 x 800 metre relay, the 600-metre, and the 4 x 400 metre relay, respectively. The latter could have been a gold, too, as Fairall noted, had Melissa Bishop not been tripped up on her leg of the race.
All told in the competition, the men had six gold medals, four silver medals, and five bronze medals, while the women had five gold, four silver, and three bronze.
Not only were the points good news going into the CIS Championships - hosted by Windsor - but the way they were earned was significant as well, as only top finishes earn a team points at nationals.
“Our other kids fought tooth and nail for the championship and I was really proud of them. And actually, if you really look at it, the number of gold medals we captured is a really good indicator of our potential success at CIS, because it’s them that will get medals there. In the past we’ve scored a lot of points from fifth to eighth, which is good for the OUs, but it’s not going to score at the CIs, or even get into CIs,” said Fairall.
“We’ve had five women gold medals and six men gold medals, and four women silver and four men silver. That’s very positive and good to take into the national championships. And we always, traditionally, compete very well at home. So we’re hoping to even turn it up a notch here,” he added.
The tournament will be held at the St. Denis Centre on March 13, and all day on March 14. Stay tuned to golancers.ca for ticket prices and information.
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