ROCHESTER, N.Y- The Cortland women's indoor track and field team, ranked 14th regionally, tied for 21st place out of 33 schools that scored points at the All-Atlantic Region Indoor Track and Field Conference (AARTFC) Championships. Nazareth College hosted the two-day event Friday and Saturday.
 
Cortland finished the meet with eight points. Ithaca was the team champion with 98 points, followed by Geneseo with 75.5.
 
Two Red Dragons earned All-AARTFC honors with top-eight finishes at the meet. Taylor Hunter (Buffalo/Tapestry Charter) placed third in the 200-meter dash in 25.54 seconds and Shannon Imbornoni (Bethpage/Our Lady of Mercy Academy) was seventh in the 800 meters in 2:19.85.
 
Three other Cortland athletes competed at the meet. Kelly Gardner (Lake Ronkonkoma/Sachem North) just missed out on All-AARTFC accolades with a ninth-place effort in the triple jump (11.09 meters/36' 4.75"). Nicole Van Pelt (Montgomery/Valley Central) tied for 13th place in the high jump (1.50 meters/4' 11") and Stephanie Kiluba (Kingston) placed 14th in the 60-meter hurdles (9.49).
 
Cortland awaits the announcement of qualifiers for next weekend's NCAA Division III Championships, which be held in Winston-Salem, N.C., March 13-14. The final participant list will be posted on NCAA.com this Sunday, March 8, by 7 p.m. The top 20 in each individual event and the top 12 in each relay (4x400 and DMR) qualify for nationals. As of late Saturday night, Hunter is the lone Red Dragon to be in a national qualifying spot as she ranks 15th in the 200-meter dash.

Complete Results:
Women
Men

Coach's Corner - Comments from Cortland Head Coach Steve Patrick:

The AARTFC meet is always a little bittersweet, in that it signals the end of the indoor season for all except a few of our family.  Because it is a high-caliber meet, it is also a high pressure situation, especially for those individuals that are close to having a performance good enough for NCAA Championships qualification.
 
We had a small women's squad attending, as for the most part it made more sense to focus on preparation for the outdoor track and field season after a great SUNYAC weekend.  While we generally had a very strong day, the highlight was pretty obvious with the great run by Taylor Hunter in the 200!  She put together an amazing effort – entering the meet ranked 5th and finishing 3rd, improving her NCAA seed time by nearly .2 seconds, and really announced herself as a national-level competitor!
 
The men's squad was larger, but still relatively small, and we intentionally kept out a couple of individuals that were already safely qualified for next weekend's NCAA Championships.  While we didn't get the qualifiers we were hoping for out of the meet, we had a number of great efforts – some season bests and/or career bests.  We're in the strange position of having done better than we have ever done in a few places, but still just being a bit short of qualifying for the NCAA Championships.  That makes the weekend very bittersweet!  The experience of watching the live results from a meet in Iowa to see if a relay is going to stay ranked high enough to qualify is a pretty unusual thing to do, especially when it ends with disappointment for the guys. 
 
On the other hand, it says a great deal about the kind of student-athletes we have and the type of program we are that we are so close to qualifying in so many different events, and it is with great pride that I am confident that we will continue to do the things we need to do to move forward to a better position this outdoor season!  On a side note, a runner-up team finish is as pretty cool thing to accomplish in a meet of this size, and something we are definitely able to find some enjoyment in!
 
We're anxiously awaiting the final publication of the NCAA performance list so that we can finalize entries to the NCAA Championships for next weekend – we're excited for those that have qualified to get out and compete well with the best in the nation!