LAKELAND, Fla. — The Ave Maria Track and Field team had their best showing in the Sun Conference Championships in their young four-year history. The Gyrenes won six individual championships across the two-day event. As a team, the men placed fourth in the conference and the women placed third.
Both the men's and women's teams won three individual championships. The women's team was led by Caitlyn O'Brien who won two of the three gold medals. The indoor All-American won the long jump with a mark of 5.88 meters, which she hit on her first attempt. She out-jumped the second place finished by 25 centimeters, or almost 10 inches.
O'Brien's second gold medal came in the heptathlon, posting a score of 4159 points. Of the seven events in the contest, O'Brien won four and placed second in another. The four she won were the 100 hurdles, the high jump, the 200 meters and the long jump. O'Brien scored 148 more points than second place, who was fellow Gyrene Allison Watkins. The highest scoring non-Gyrene was from Southeastern in third place and 385 points behind O'Brien.
The women's team's final championship was won by Molly From in the high jump. From posted an NAIA B standard mark of 1.67 meters, beating second place also by 25 centimeters. It was a career-high mark for the junior and an improvement of 11 centimeters from last year's championship in which she finished second.
The Gyrenes had 11 more podium finishes, including two relay teams, along with their three championships for a total of 20 medals received over the weekend.
On the men's side, the Gyrenes won three individual championships from three different athletes.
Donavan Mattson continued his incredible graduate year at Ave Maria with a win in the 1500 meters. Mattson posted a time of 3:54.77, beating second place by 89 hundredths of a second.
Continuing Ave Maria's dominance in the distance races, Connor Coyle took home gold in the 10,000 meters with a time of 33:25.75. Coyle beat a runner from St. Thomas by over 27 seconds to win first place.
Ave Maria's final championship was in the 3000 meter steeplechase as John Halversen took home the gold. The senior posted a time of 9:47.96 and was the only runner to complete the obstacle course in under 10 minutes.
The Gyrenes had four more podium finishes for a total of seven medals. Ave Maria almost had a clean sweep of the distance events, but a half second difference put Mattson in second place in the 5000 meters.
"I was just really inspired by the team," said head coach Alan Webb after the championships. "It's a reflection of a whole year of work and training. And seeing that be rewarded with successes…was just really, really special."
With the conference championships in the books, the Gyrenes now wait patiently for the NAIA to announce qualifiers for the National Championships, which will be May 20-22 in Asheville, North Carolina.
