ST. LOUIS, Mo. – The Brandeis University track and field teams had five scoring performances and several competitors advance to the finals on the first day of action at the 2022 University Athletic Association Outdoor Track and Field Championships at Washington University today. The women scored 15 points to rank sixth with eight events scored, while the men had three points after eight events to rank seventh.
The top performer on the day was sophomore Smiley Huynh (Bronx, N.Y. / Bronx H.S. of Science), who was responsible for 10 of the women's 15 points. Competing at her first UAA outdoor meet, Huynh established a pair of personal bests to place fourth in both the pole vault and the long jump. In the pole vault, she reached a height of 3.37 meters (11 feet, ¾ inches), missing a tie for second with two others based on the number of attempts. In the long jump, she added 0.21 meters on to her p.r. with a distance of 5.39 meters (17 feet, 8 ¼ inches). Huynh's 5.39 meter jump came on her final attempt, moving her up three places in the process. She was just nine centimeters out of a top-three performance and All-UAA honors.
The women's final individual scoring performance on the women's side came in the 3,000-meter steeplechase. Sophomore Juliette Intrieri (North Salem, N.Y. / North Salem) cut nine seconds off her personal-best time with a mark of 12:16-29, 21 seconds ahead of the next finisher.
The Brandeis women also placed fifth in the 4x800-meter relay. Junior Victoria Morrongielo (Staten Island, N.Y. / Susan E. Wagner) led off the race, followed by sophomore Lizzy Reynolds (Winchester, Mass. / Winchester), junior Bridget Pickard (Westwood, Mass. / Westwood) and senior Natalie Hattan (Sugar Land, Texas/Clements). They posted a time of 9:39.19, just over half a second ahead of Carnegie Mellon for fifth.
The men's lone scoring performance came in the 4x800-meter relay as well, as the team of senior Aaron Portman (Wheeling, Ill. / Adlai E. Stevenson), senior Jacob Grant (Rockville Center, N.Y. / South Side), sophomore Willem Goff (Pelham, Mass. / Amherst Regional) and sophomore Samuel Kim (La Jolla, Calif. / Phillips Exeter (N.H.)) finished in sixth place with a time of 8:09.12.
The Judges sent six competitors to tomorrow's finals. The top performances came from sophomore Alya Campbell (Eastchester, N.Y. / Eastchester) in the 100-meter hurdles. Campbell lowered the school record in the event with a time of 15.02 seconds, good for fifth in qualifying. She lowered the previous record, held by teammate Sonali Anderson (Fayetteville, Ga./Whitewater) by 0.19 seconds.
Senior Dion Morris-Evans (Canal Fulton, Ohio/Northwest) advanced to tomorrow's finals in the men's 110-meter hurdles with a time of 15.45 seconds, shaving nearly three-quarters of a second off his season-best time. He qualified in sixth place.
The Brandeis women will have two competitors in the 400-meter hurdle, with sophomore Olivia Zarzycki (Belmont, Mass. / Belmont) running 1:06.09 and junior Yahni Lapa (West Newton, Mass. / Newton North) running 1:07.39, to place fourth and eighth, respectively. Both were personal-bests.
Sophomore Liz Korn (Piedmont, Calif. / Piedmont) recorded a p.r. in the 400-meter dash with a time of 59.13 seconds, almost two seconds faster than her previous best, to advance in sixth place.