ITHACA, N.Y. – The Cortland men's indoor track and field team posted six AARTFC-qualifying performances at the Cornell Deneault Invitational.
 
Jack Bisbee (Deer Park/Half Hollow Hills West) finished second out of 40 runners in the 800 meters in 1:57.23. Aaron Jones (Buffalo/Hutch Tech) hit AARTFC marks twice as he was third of 47 in the 200-meter dash (22.52) and fifth of 22 in the 60-meter hurdles (8.22). Mitch Diamond (Dix HIlls/Half Hollow Hills West) placed third of 24 in the triple jump (13.65 meters/44' 9.5") and Isaiah Brunache (Bennington, VT/Mount Anthony Union) was fifth of 28 in the shot put (15.09 meters/49' 6.25"). Matthew Schaffert (Lockport) rounded out Cortland's AARTFC qualifying group with a sixth-place finish out of 38 competitors in the 60-meter dash (7.00).
 
Nick Kaires (St. James/Smithtown East) and Logan Darling (Homer) finished second (15.26 meters/50' 0.75") and third (15.00 meters/49' 2.5"), respectively, out of 21 competitors in the weight throw. Logan Buchanan (Dundee) placed fourth in the high jump (1.75 meters/5' 8.75") and Brandon Levin (Baldwinsville/C.W. Baker) was fifth in the 200-meter dash (22.72).
 
In the triple jump, Hayden Erick (Dundee) finished seventh (13.17 meters/43' 2.5") and Camden Buchanan (Dundee) placed eighth (13.01 meters/42' 8.25"). Nick LaRocque (Millbrook) finished seventh in the shot put (13.88 meters/45' 6.5"), followed by Tommy Burek (Latham/Shaker) in eighth (13.74 meters/45' 1"), and Austin Garske (Rocky Point) was seventh of 26 in the 400-meter dash (52.75).
 
Cortland will compete at the SUNYAC Championships on Friday and Saturday, Feb. 23-24, at Brockport.

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

This week was a short trip over to Cornell to tune-up in a few areas for a few folks on the team, and to chase some qualifying performances for the conference meet where we could. A number of our folks didn't compete this weekend, as attending the meet wouldn't have been as valuable a means to improvement as training through the weekend could have offered, so we had a notably smaller squad this week.
 
Some notable highlights/performance improvements that we saw included Alexia Prince with a big PR in the 200 to earn a spot in the conference meet, Brandon Levin improving on his conference seed with a flat-track season best in the 200, and Abby Hardy running a flat-track season best in the 400 to improve on her SUNYAC standing.
 
Jack Bisbee had a tremendous run in the 800 (running 1:57.23) to move well up the conference list, in one of our stronger performances of the day. Teammate Hector Ramos run an indoor PR in the 800 as well dominating his heat in pretty substantial fashion.
 
Closing out on the track, Cherise Mack and Deirdre Sullivan ran a very smart and tough race to post solid times in the 5k. Both are coming off of some setbacks through the start of the indoor season that limited training, so this was a great step that bodes well for the upcoming outdoor season.
 
In the vertical jumps Abby Carberry posted a nice college PR in the pole vault; all three women in the high jump performed well, but obviously Danielle Fisk's jump – #2 all-time at Cortland – was a pretty tremendous result on the day. In the horizontal jumps AnJalyna Talmadge (long jump) and Matteson Donnelly (triple jump) produced season's bests for the women's squad; the men's triple jump group was probably the strongest on the day as all four competitors had season's bests, most notably from Mitch Diamond getting an AAARTFC Championships qualifying mark and Cam Buchanan who solidified his qualification into the SUNYAC Championships.
 
Last but not least, Logan Darling took advantage of his chance in the weight throw, hitting a big PR and moving up a number of spots in the conference ranking to now be sitting in the 8th spot.
 
We're excited to take this momentum into next weekend's SUNYAC Championships on Friday and Saturday in Brockport, NY.