Over the weekend, the Binghamton men’s and women’s track teams competed at the River Hawk Invitational hosted by UMass Lowell in Boston, Massachusetts. Despite there being no team scoring, the Bearcats earned eight combined podium placements, including two first-place finishes.

“It was kind of up and down,” said Binghamton head coach Mike Thompson. “There were a few really good performances and a good number of solid performances, but I think that it was okay.”

After earning two first-place finishes in the past two meets, junior Jenna Chan continued her successful start to the season with yet another victory. The Bearcat took gold in the 60-meter hurdles, clocking in at 8.75 seconds. Additionally, Chan competed in the 200-meter dash and placed fifth with a time of 25.25.

“[Chan’s] time in the [60] hurdles was average for her, but she ran a really good 200,” Thompson said. “So she had a good day. Winning the hurdles was great, but I’m sure she would’ve liked to run faster than that.”

Additionally, on the women’s side, senior Carolyn Burnell and graduate student Stephanie Cassens were runners-up. Burnell raced the 3000-meter in 10:04.68 and Cassens competed in the 1000-meter with a time of 2:54.38. Cassens’ time in the 1000 puts her third in all-time in BU program history, right behind recent graduate Emily Mackay.

“That was the first time [Cassens] ever ran the 1000,” Thompson said. “That’s the furthest she’s ever raced, so that was a great performance for her. Since she had never run that far in competition, she was a little uncertain about how it would go, but she ran really well. I think that was the number three time of all time for us, so it was a great race.”

Highlighting the men’s side was junior Brandon Love who had a first-place finish in the pole vault. His 15-07.00 foot clearance earned him the sole individual victory for the men’s team. Junior Marcus Johnson claimed second place in the triple jump with a leap of 46-09.00 feet and graduate student Jake Restivo was third in the long jump with a 22-05.25 foot jump.

“[Love] has become consistent in the pole vault which is important because that’s when the big performances come,” Thompson said. “You perform consistently and then that’s usually when people pop a big one, and I think he’s ready to do that.”

Furthermore, sophomore Jaston Ormsby and junior Josh Stone both registered personal bests in their events. Ormsby took second place in the weight throw with a 56-05.00 foot toss, and Stone earned the bronze in the 3000, clocking in a time of 8:22.75.

“They’re gonna need a couple more weeks to be ready to compete at conference,” Thompson said. “I’m happy with where some people are, and others are not doing quite as well as we would like them to or as they would like themselves to. It’ll be interesting to see how the next two weeks go. Conference is in three weeks, so it’s actually coming up pretty quick so we’ll see.”

The America East (AE) Championships are scheduled to take place from Saturday, Feb. 18 to Sunday, Feb.19. Until then, the Bearcats have two weeks of competition, starting this weekend.

“Just the usual stuff this time of year,” Thompson said. “This time of year we push them a little harder in practice this week coming up and then start backing off so that they are well rested going into the conference meet.”

Binghamton competes again this Saturday, Feb. 4 at the Penn State National Open and Kane Invitational. Both meets are scheduled to begin at 10 a.m.