By: Kate Wiggins
For the past two weekends, the Canisius outdoor track-and-field team has competed at the University at Buffalo Spring Opener on Friday, April 8, and the Bison Outdoor Classic hosted by Bucknell University on April 15 and 16.
Starting at the Spring Opener at UB, the women’s team took third place, finishing with a total of 70 points. Five of them posted top-10 finishes in the 200-meter dash. Sophomore Maura Johnson led the Griffs, taking second place with a finishing time of 26.62. In the 3,000-meter run, senior Libby Benzer crossed the finish line in second place out of 31 runners, with a time of 9:59.67. Junior Marissa Silba came in fourth, crossing the line with a time of 10:21.50. In the 400-meter hurdle, sophomore Katie Gawronski had a time of 1:08.04, earning herself a second place finish. Junior Rylee Campeau also earned a second-place finish in the 3,000-meter steeplechase with a time of 12:18.03.
The men’s team finished in sixth place with a total of 52 points. In the 1,500-meter run, there were also five Griffs to have top-10 finishes. Junior Andrew Perreault led the pack, finishing in fourth place with a time of 3:56.26. Senior Michael Peppy took third place in the 3,000-meter event with a school-record time of 8:31.65. In the 4x400-meter relay, the team of sophomore’s Ryan McDonald, Kevin Board, Nick Dauphinee and freshman Alejandro Diez finished with a time of 3:48.40 to earn fifth place.
At the Bison Outdoor Classic, the weekend started off with the women’s 1,500-meter unseeded run, with sophomore Jules Jones posting a career-best time of 4:54.97. In the men’s unseeded race, graduate students Turner Dirrigl and Richard Moore had finishing times of 4:04.90 and 4:06.85, respectively. In the invitational men’s 1,500, Perreault finished with a time of 3:54.29. Benzer led the Griffs in the women’s 5,000-meter run with a 14th-place finish and a time of 17:13.98. Appenheimer posted a 16th-place finish in the 10,000-meter run with a time of 30:10.52.
On the second day, Gawronski ran a second all-time school record in the 400-meter hurdles event with a time of 1:07.38. In the women’s 3,000-meter run, senior Bailey Pierce had a 12th-overall finish with a time of 11:00.36, which is a new personal best. In the men’s race, sophomore Thomson Chew also recorded a personal best time and also 12th overall with a time of 8:56.99. The track and field team will head back to UB this upcoming weekend to compete in the University at Buffalo Invitational.