“We are really excited about the win today,” Head Coach Ritchie Beene said. “We knew we were going to need to come from behind today and we had talked about that in our meeting last night. The thing about that is the respect I have for Prairie View, their athletes and their coaching staff. But where there is a will there is a way and we got out here today and not everything went our way, but we kept fighting.”
The men had a solid championship finishing sixth in a close race with 89 points. ASU was only five points from fifth and 25 points out of third.
The men were led on the final day by three first place finishes. Freshman Chris Amisial started the wins in the pole vault. His winning vault was 4.15m. What made the event really special was it was his first college pole vault event.
Another freshman, Brandon Coombs was next with an individual championship when he came from behind to win the 800m run. He finished the event with a time of 1:52.98.
The final win came from Lee Thrasher, who topped a strong season with a win in the discus throw. His winning throw travelled 46.49m which was a personal record for him.
The lack of distance runners actually hurt the Hornets chances of finishing even higher as they had moved into third place, but did not have enough runners for those distance events that eventually caused them to fall back later in the day.
“The men really stepped up today,” Beene said. “I am excited about what we are doing with the men's program. We know it is not going to be built overnight. I need to continue to teach them they need to be patient and we have to continue to recruit . The field is so big and everyone is competing to get young men. As long as our men stay strong, positive and work together we can get it built.”
The Lady Hornets trailed the entire day until the 100m dash when Brianna Scott-Glover's fourth place finish and Paris Thompson's fifth place finish handed ASU nine points and a 107.5-106 lead with just seven events left.
Even after taking the lead, ASU was never really able to pull away until the 5000 meter run. Going into the 5k, the Lady Hornets only led 178.5-171.33, but made the lead insurmountable gaining 10 points on Artrailia LeSane's third place finish and Paige Rankine's fifth place finish. That gave ASU a 188.5-173.33 lead with only one race left.
The Lady Hornets also continued their dominance in the 4x100m relay event. The team of Jasmine Pope, Alexis Ferebee, Latrice Lee and Scott-Glover ran the event in 45.39, which was their best time of the season.
“Overall this has been an exciting weekend and I am so happy for these ladies,”Beene said. “A lot of people in the SWAC are going to come for you, but there is one thing about it, if you are going to get a SWAC Championship right now you have to come through ASU.”
ASU will begin preparations for any athletes going to the East Regional which will be held in Greensboro, N.C., May 24-25.
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