CORTLAND, N.Y. – The Cortland women's outdoor track and field team won four events at the Red Dragon Open, hosted by Cortland on Friday. The meet was changed from a two-day meet Saturday and Sunday to a one-day meet Friday due to the weather.
 
Autumn Pittman (Spring Valley/Ramapo) earned two of those victories with All-Atlantic Region Track and Field Conference (AARTFC) qualifying times. She finished first of 31 in the 100-meter dash in 12.14 seconds, which ranks 24th nationally in Division III as of Saturday night, and she was first of 47 in the 200-meter dash in 25.04 seconds.
 
Lillian Swyers (Peru) won the triple jump with a distance of 10.99 meters (36' 0.75"0 and Cheyenne McPeek (Johnson City) was first of 24 in the discus at 37.65 meters (123' 6"). McPeek was one of three Red Dragons to post AARTFC marks in the hammer throw. She finished third at 47.29 meters (155' 2"), Hannah McMasters (Homer) placed fourth at 46.52 meters (152' 7") and Jennifer Ndukwu (Queens/Metropolitan Expeditionary Learning School) was fifth at 46.05 meters (151' 1").
 
Four Red Dragons finished in the top five in the shot put. AnJalyna Talmadge (Pine Bush) was the runner-up out of 30 competitors at 11.89 meters (39' 0.25"). McMasters finished third (11.32 meters/37' 1.75"), Kayla Tretola (Levittown/Island Trees) was fourth (11.22 meters/36' 9.75") and McPeek finished fifth (11.05 meters/36' 3"). In the discus, McPeek's victory was followed by Tretola in a tie for fourth (34.50 meters/113' 2"), Jess Neubert (Buffalo/Kenmore East) in sixth (33.39 meters/109' 6") and McMasters in eighth (32.16 meters/105' 6").
 
Ryan Stark (Schuylerville) finished second in the pole vault, clearing 3.20 meters (10' 6"). In the triple jump, Caitlin Maher (Hartsdale/Ardsley) finished third (10.21 meters/33' 6'), Hannah Nolan (Montour Falls/Odessa-Montour) was fifth (10.01 meters/32' 10.25") and Lexi Clark (Chazy/Chazy Central Rural School) finished seventh (9.85 meters/32' 3.75").
Faith Nelson (Rensselaer/Columbia) led a trio of top-six finishers in the 400-meter dash in 1:01.38. Izzie Bosko (Hillsdale/Taconic Hills) finished fifth (1:01.56) and Matty Lucey (Freeville/Groton) was sixth (1:01.78). Reilly Quinn (Morrisonville/Beekmantown) tied for fourth (1.53 meters/5' 0.25") and Regan Kaiser (Queensbury/Glens Falls) placed seventh (1.48 meters/4' 10.25") in the high jump.
 
Other Red Dragon top-eight showings at the meet included Swyers in sixth place in the 100-meter hurdles (15.77), Melissa Innocent (Elmont/Valley Stream North) in sixth in the 1,500 meters (4:52.21), Talmadge in sixth in the long jump (4.87 meters/15' 11.75"), and Yasmine Peralta (Monroe/Monroe-Woodbury) in seventh and Gianna Motto (East Islip) in eighth in the 100-meter dash, both officially at 13.09 seconds in different heats.

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

Moving the meet from Saturday to Friday was a pretty big undertaking, but given the forecast, I'm really glad that we were able to do it. Our thanks to our facilities folks, administration, timing company, officials, and of course the participating teams that were able to make last-minute adjustments to be able to make this work!
 
We're quite pleased with how the teams performed today! We had a lot of strong, focused efforts, which is quite exciting, especially as they have been pushing quite hard in training since returning from spring break. A number of our folks 'ran out of gas' later in the day, but that is pretty understandable given what we have been doing, and it being late and somewhat chilly at the end of the day. But even when folks physically weren't capable of peak performances, the effort and focus remained pretty good. That will serve us well down the road!
 
Some folks that deserve a shout out today would include the women's 1500 squad, especially Jewel Jones and Deirdre Sullivan with huge new PRs, the women's discus throwers, especially Colleen Patrie with a new PR, the men in the 100, led by Zion Cheatham breaking 11 seconds for the first time and followed closely by Daniel Cruz with a new PR, and firstyears Lassad Richards (400) and Jordan Wingert (800) with stellar new PRs. Those aren't by any means the only strong performances (or new PRs) that we had on the day, but those all stood out as pretty strong performances and representative of what we are trying to do here.
 
We are looking forward to competing at Utica and down at Bucknell this upcoming weekend.