Talkin' HEPS

what about harvard women winning the 4x800 out of no where?!

darkhorse much? wrote:

what about harvard women winning the 4x800 out of no where?!

They ran a fine race. I believe it was the first of the day for each of them (two had missed the 800 final, two the 1500), so they were a little fresher than some of their competition, but for them to have averaged 2:14, most must have stepped up their game.

But it's of a piece with their team's overall performance--one point out of third place. As others have observed, it's easier (or at least quicker) to get a women's team to be competitive; I honestly think the H men's program is progressing, too, but it will take longer for the positive changes to show.

They certainly have been progressing, and their guys team showed progress too, not finishing last for the first time in a long time.

Not that any team "deserves" to finish DFL, but cmon, Columbia didn't enter anyone in 11 events (Harvard didn't have anyone in 7)! Thats embaressing, for a team that recruits as well as they do for mid distance, you'd think that theyd be able to build from that strength into at least a stronger distance squad, if not strength in other event groups.

Speaking of complete team strength, the Cornell women didn't show much more of it outdoors than they did indoors. Maduka accounted for 38 points in individual events alone (add in her leg on their 4x1 victory, and she had a rediculous day). Their team ran well for the personnel they have, but if you subtract the insane day Maduka had, they're not even close. That's the definition of an MVP right there. Cornell should take this as a warning though, they need to find some depth to fill in around her.

The Cornell men had as complete a victory as could be wished. They failed to score in only two events (the multis and jav), and showed depth in the sprints that hasn't been there before. I didn't see Merrill compete, its possible he's injured I guess, but that would have added even more on top of what they had in the 110s and 400Hs. They graduate a ton, but that their showing reasonable strength in all areas should be encouraging to a team thats definitly establishing itself as a Heptagonal track dynasty.

Also on the men's side, Seabrook had what would have been my vote for performance of the meet, had Maduka not set the bar rediculously high. Wins at 400m and 400H, as well as a 2nd in the 4x1 and a 4x4 anchor victory means you've had a good day and you're the class of the field.

Princeton's Kashmiri certainly gave it his all, despite his ailing hamstring, that he was able to make both the 100 and 200 finals and still be good enough to hop in the blocks the next day was impressive. Thats the definition of dedication.

Yale's Reynolds Holmes had a great home crowd with him in the LJ, taking second place on his last jump. Clutch.

In all, a great meet, as usual.

Pundit, I think you'll find that Columbia no longer has a throwing field which really screws them for competing for a championship.

Merrill was injured, hamstring I think, Kashmiri did run the 4x100 relay leg on the Sunday but as you say his hamstring (?) gave out in the 100m final.

Pundit wrote:

Yale's Reynolds Holmes had a great home crowd with him in the LJ, taking second place on his last jump. Clutch.

As was the Brown triple jumper who placed second with his last jump.

Video coverage of the meet is here:

http://www.runnerspace.com/eprofile.php?event_id=109

All finals, and they're working on getting all the trials.

Okay, time to start focusing on XC. (I think there was an XC '08 thread, but can't find it easily now.) So how do things look, with the season starting in a month or so? Is Princeton still the pick to win both sides of Heps?

By the way, *thanks* to the poster above for hooking us up with those great videos from outdoor Heps. I hadn't seen them before!

Okay, time to start revving up for track! What are your thoughts? With their great recruiting pluses, will Harvard (M&W) continue moving up? Brown women?

Princeton women are just so loaded in some areas that it's hard to see how they could be defeated in a Heps, though Cornell managed to pull it off last year. Princeton men, I see, brought in another ungodly crop of recruits--how does their event coverage look?

I know most Ivy teams don't get "serious" until after New Year's, but I'm sure there'll be some competition in December--as always, I'm particularly interested to hear about anyone (teams/individuals) who could surprise, either as rookies or by stepping up their game significantly from last year.

Do the Cornell men have Wyner and Canaday back??? That's a bit surprising in itself, if so...

Okay, maybe I should ask again after finals are over. Good luck to all on those!

chenoweth should win the 5k indoors and out

i see maag focusing on the mile/3k indoors and probably running the 1500 outdoors because he thinks he will easily win heps in it.

other than him 800-mile is pretty wide open this year though. columbia returns two sub 150 guys, yale still has their very good group of milers, princeton is loaded as usual, and harvard has some good young kids.

im especially excited to see what jarrett, cabral and leung do.

b u m p

The mile will be good. Maag and the Princeton crew are very talented, columbia always has good md guys, Cornell's Miller split a 4:00 1600 at penn relays. I know Yale had two talented guys, did they graduate?

b u m p

what about the girls?!!?

what about... wrote:

what about the girls?!!?

A check of the rosters on the Cornell website indicates that Maduka is not on the basketball roster this year? A big surprise, after she led that team to its first-ever (IIRC) Ivy championship last year.

OTOH she had a *huge* first meet in December, so maybe she's focusing on track and thinking "national championship":

An early roster for the Cornell women seemed smaller than usual, but it has since expanded to its normal ~90. Ditto for the men...

Any Ivies competing this weekend? I see that Cornell is not...

Princeton and Penn at Navy next week