St. John’s Ties for Third at the Penn 8-Team Select

Saturday, January 19

Staten Island, N.Y.

St. John's University

Penn 8-Team Select

St. John’s Ties for Third at the Penn 8-Team Select

1/20/2019 11:34:00 AM | Women's Track and Field

The Red Storm finished in a tie with BIG EAST foe Providence

Final Results

          QUEENS, N.Y. (Jan. 20, 2019) – A year after its fifth-place finish, the St. John's track & field team rose to third at the Penn 8-Team Select held at Staten Island's Ocean Breeze Athletic Complex on Saturday evening.

            The Red Storm tied BIG EAST foe Providence with 34 points at the Staten Island facility. Penn took the meet with 160 points, followed by Monmouth in second with 78 points.

            Sophomore sprinter Leah Anderson continued her dominance in 2019 with her fourth-straight top-two finish. After two first-places finishes at the TCNJ Lions Indoor Invitational a week ago, the sophomore sprinter came in second place in both the 200m and 400m with times of 24.66 and 55.93, respectively, at the Penn 8-Team Select.

            Anderson has now finished in second place at this meet three times. Her first came last year when she was a part of the 4x400m relay team alongside Kafi Ottley, Torisha LaForce and Jasmine Burkett.

            St. John's weight throwers were on display this weekend as all four throwers-- Jennifer Odoemene, Ashley Walsh, Bernadette McGowan and Samantha Morillo-- landed themselves in the finals. Odoemene's throw of 17.15m eclipsed her mark from last year's meet by over two meters (15.09m). Odoemene finished in third followed by Walsh in sixth (15.76m), McGowan in seventh (14.87m) and Morillo in eighth (14.14m).

            Shot putter Amarys Berry, along with McGowan and Morillo, also found herself in an event final.

            Berry launched into second place among BIG EAST competitors with an ECAC qualifying and personal-best throw of 14.11m, good for fourth place at the Penn 8-Team Select. The junior shot putter improved her throw by nearly half a meter (13.52m) from last year's event.

            Senior Destiny Davis also scored points for St. John's after finishing fourth in the 200m with a personal-best time of 24.75.

            McGowan also surpassed her throw from last season by launching the shot put 13.19m, 0.76 meters further than her toss at last year's meet. McGowan's fifth-place finish was followed by freshman Morillo's 12.95m throw, which placed her in seventh.

            Through the first four meets of the indoor season, St. John's has 16 athletes placed inside the BIG EAST top-five and 31 in the top-10 across 14 events. Of those athletes, three - Anderson in the 200m dash, Odoemene in the weight throw and Ja'Tae Joyner in the triple jump - hold first place among BIG EAST competitors.

            The Red Storm will get their final tune-up before the Metropolitan Championships at the Dr. Sander Invitational/Columbia Challenge on Thursday through Saturday, Jan. 24-26.