The season winds down

This weekend the Portland State track and field team will be heading over to Forest Grove to compete in the Pacific Twilight. The team added the new meet late in the season to give athletes yet another chance to continue work on their main events and take time to improve on secondary competitions.

One such athlete is junior Sean Mackelvie, who will be competing in three different events. Two of his events, the javelin and triple jump, are usual events for him, but something new to his usual line-up will be the 200-meter.

In the men’s distance, new teammates will be added to the usual line up of junior John Lawrence in the 3,000-meter steeplechase and senior Andrew Slag in the 1,500-meter. Joining Lawrence in the steeplechase will be Nate Endicott, freshman Cary Dunagan and junior Gilmer Gongora. Freshmen companions Zachary Carpenter, Jose Rodriguez and Clay Strycker will accompany Slag in his race.

Breaking out of his usual distance running and trying a field event and a sprint will be junior Mark Bozarth-Dreher. He will be competing in the 400-meter with his fellow teammate, sophomore Nate Lightner, whose main event is the 400-m. His field event will be the shot put, and competing with him will be redshirt freshman Jaret Rockenbach.

Also, the Vikings are adding a new event to the line up this weekend. Junior Moe Spencer will be the sole Viking competing in the men’s hammer throw. Freshman Luke Leddige will also be starting to convert over to being a multi-event athlete, and this meet is competing in the 100-meter, the long jump and discus throw.

On the women’s side, the line up stays mostly the same as far as athletes competing in their main events goes. However, more Viking women will be participating from the usual ones and some will even be sitting this weekend out. Those sitting out will be juniors Joenisha Vinson and Anaiah Rhodes.

Some new Vikings to hit the track will be the Castillo twins, Brandy and Brittany, both sophomores from Carlsbad, N.M. Brandy will be running the 5,000-meter and Brittany the 1,500-m with fellow classmate Amber Rozcicha. Also, returning to the track at this meet will be sophomore Brittany Long in the 3,000-m steeplechase.

Some other big news in the world of track and field this week is that both junior Tony Criosfulli and senior Karene King were named Big Sky Athletes of the Week in men and women’s track, respectively.

Crisofull, a native from Vail, Colo., won this award thanks to the hard work he put in at the Oregon Relays last weekend in the 800-meter. There he set a new fastest time record for the Big Sky Conference this year with his time of 1:49.11, which set a new PSU record as well. It’s a .65-second improvement for his career best, and now he holds the conference by a .78 lead. After numerous nominations for Athlete of the Week, this is Crisofulli’s first time being awarded the honor.

King, native to Tortola, British Virgin Islands, was given this honor due to her performance in the 200-m at the Oregon Relays. She finished second with a time of 23.86, the second fastest in the Portland State records, and moved up to number 40 in the NCAA West region. It’s King’s second time winning the award, after her first in January during the indoor season.

Next weekend the Vikings will compete in their last regular meet, the Oregon Twilight, before they head back down to Sacramento, Calif., for the Big Sky Outdoor Championship, which will be held on May 11–14.  ?