Sports

Sports Shorts

Feb. 10, 2009

1825 sportsshorts
Jack H. Bourbonnais ’10 fights through a crowd of opponents during the men’s 5000 meter run during the Engineers’ indoor track meet at the Johnson Athletic Center on Saturday.
Vibin Kundukulam—The Tech

Men’s Track & Field Opens Home Slate with Win

The nationally-ranked No.7 MIT men’s track and field team hosted Williams and Coast Guard in its first indoor meet of the season on Saturday afternoon at the Johnson track. The Engineers picked up 13 event wins and earned 171 points on their way to a comfortable win over second-place Williams (117.50). Coast Guard earned 87.50 points for third place.

Jeremiah R. “Yermie” Cohen ’09 picked up right where he left off last week at Bowdoin with a pair of wins in the mile and 800m. Cohen ran a 4:18.88 mile to take the event for the second-straight week, just outlasting Macklin Chaffee of Williams (4:19.19). Cohen then out-kicked Chaffee at 800 meters finishing just five hundredths of a second better than the second-place finisher at 1:58.16. Teammate William S. Phipps ’09 was the next across the finish line at 1:59.08.

All-American Stephen A. Morton ’10 earned 28 points for the host Engineers, winning his four specialties, the 55-meter dash, the 200 meters, and the long and triple jumps. Morton (6.54) just missed his own personal best at 55m, set last weekend at Bowdoin. He then raced to a comfortable win at 200m, finishing in 22.63, more than a second faster than the runner-up. A week after fouling out in the long jump a week ago, Morton found his home surface much more comfortable, clearing 7.09m, by far his best jump of the season. Morton (14.58m) and Mattias S. Flander ’11 (13.69m) also teamed up to go one-two in the triple jump.

Despite those impressive individual performances, the Cardinal and Grey would not have won the meet so convincingly without the depth displayed in a number of other events. Hemagiri Arumugam ’10 (8:50.83) led the way in the 3000m, as he, Paul D. Welle ’11 and Daniel E. Harper ’12 claimed three of the top four spots. Tech also had three finishers in the top four at 5000 meters, with Gihan S. Amarasiriwardena ’11 crossing the finish line first at 15:26.51. MIT swept the top three spots in the shot put with Mitchell J. Kelley ’11 throwing 13.79m for first.

The Engineers will host a Coed Invitational next weekend while also taking part in the Valentine’s Meet at Boston University.

­­­­—Greg McKeever, DAPER Staff