Track thrives at Cardinal Classic

Tom Kuebel
Staff Writer

North Central men’s and women’s track & field teams competed on Friday for the annual Cardinal Classic at the state of the art Al B. Carius complex.

Both teams had successful meets with the No. 1 rankedmen’s team finishing in first place and the women’s team finishing in second.

The men’s team had their hands full in this meet holding off No. 4 ranked UW-Whitewater by a mere 25 points.

The Cards were led by strong performances in the field by Robert Kapustka, ’12, and John Wood, ’12.

 Kapustka went for 18 points in a strong showing in front of the home crowd taking the hammer throw contests as well as claiming a second place in the shot put.

Wood set a season’s best mark of 5.25 meters placing him second in the national rankings in the event, one spot ahead of teammate Josh Winder, ’13.

The senior’s jump is good for the second best vault in NCAA Division III this season.

Wood’s performance earned  him CCIW track & field athlete of the week as well as his second time earning the conference accolade.

Continuing the trend of dominance in the field was Zach Heerspink, ’13, who improved his mark in the high jump by clearing 2.07 meters, moving him to No. 6 on the national list.

Three more event champions came through on the track for NCC including Ryan Root, ’14, in the 3000-meter run.

Root finished in a time of 8:56:00 blowing out the competition as the only competitor to finish under nine minutes.

Dionte Hackler, ’14, held off strong competition from both UW-Whitewater as well as Lewis University to stake claim to the 200-meter dash with a time of 22.18.

With that time Hackler matched Dan Benton, ’12, for the fastest time in the event thus far.

However Benton would claim a title in this meet in the 400-meter dash coming through ahead of teammate Bai Kabba, ’13.

Kabba, Benton, and Hackler would team up with Marlen Hamilton, ’14, to cap off the meet with a win in the 4-by-400 meter relay.

On the women’s side, despite posting only three event champions throughout the meet, the ladies used exceptional depth to finish in second place behind Division II Lewis University.            

The three event champions were Ebony Stallworth, ’15, in the shot put; Elizabeth Composto, ’15, in the pole vault; and Chelsea Armstrong, ’12, in the weight throw.

Composto’s vault was good enough to push her into the seventh spot in the national rankings with a height of 3.70 meters.

Her teammate Brooke Patterson, ’15, snuck into second place with a vault of 3.60 meters, good enough for thirteenth in the rankings.

Patterson claimed a second place in the triple jump as well with a mark of 10.92 meters.

With 16 points on the day Patterson was the high scorer on the meet for the Cardinals.

NCC seemed to barrage the 800-meter run with four Cardinals scoring points.

They were led by Krista Cota, ’13, with a second place finish.

Kala Bingham, ’12, Jordan Wagner, ’15, and Amy Schwent, ’12, rounded out the scoring for NCC in the event.

The Cardinals also had three finishers nab points in the 200-meter dash.

Next week for the Cards' CCIW conference championship meet here at North Central College.

Events begin on Friday at 11 a.m. and run throughout Saturday afternoon.

 The women will be competing for their first back-to-back indoor conference championship since 2007.