Men Place Fourth, Women Seventh; at Air Force Invitational
1/27/2001 12:00:00 AM | Track and Field Managers
For the record, the men's track team placed fourth Saturday in the Air Force Invitational at the Cadet Field House.
The Falcons scored 86 points to sit behind first place Colorado State's 106 points. BYU settled for third place with 105 points followed by Fresno State with 90. The Falcons finished ahead of Colorado (73), Wyoming (66, Kentucky (36) and New Mexico (12).
In women's scoring, Colorado State walked away with first place with 162.50 points. Colorado finished second (132) followed by Kentucky (86), Wyoming (56), New Mexico (47.50), Fresno State (43.50), Air Force (38.50) and Brigham Young (7)
But the real story as far as head coach Ralph Lindeman was concerned, was the performance of his freshmen athletes.
"I am thrilled with the performance of our freshmen. They are lighting a fire under the upper classmen," said Lindeman. "We said on paper before the season that this may be our best recruiting class. Now they are not only doing it on paper, they are doing it on the track and on the field.
Lindeman singled out freshman Ben Payne in the 5,000-meters where he finished third (15:28.52) on Saturday. Freshman Brittany Edmonds, who also plays volleyball for the Falcons, set a new school record in the Pentathlon on Friday, scoring 3,236 pts. Edmonds broke a 1998 record of 3,229 set by Katie Joynt. Lindeman noted it was Edmonds first career pentathlon.
Freshman Anthony Park, who took sixth place in the long jump (22-7.25), came back in the triple jump moved into first place on his last jump, only to get passed by two Fresno State competitors on their last jump. His jump of 49-8.50 ranks sixth on the school's all-time indoor list.
Sophomore pole vaulter Paul Goossen also provided some excitement during the meet. Goossen's vault of 15-11 placed him fourth in the competition.
"Two weeks ago, Goossen's lifetime best was 14-feet, 5-inches. By this rate, he could be vaulting 20 feet by the conference meet the end of February," said Lindeman.
