St. John’s Finishes in Fourth at the BIG EAST Indoor Track & Field Championships

Saturday, February 23

Geneva, Ohio

St. John's University

BIG EAST Indoor Championships Day Two

St. John’s Finishes in Fourth at the BIG EAST Indoor Track & Field Championships

2/23/2019 6:04:00 PM | Women's Track and Field

2019 BIG EAST Championship Overall Results BIG EAST Individual Winners

The Red Storm brings seven medals back to Queens, including two first-place finishes

GENEVA, OHIO (Feb. 23, 2019) – The St. John's track & field team racked up 87 points en route to a fourth-place finish at the 2019 BIG EAST Indoor Track & Field Championships on Saturday.

            St. John's added five medals to its weekend total of seven at the SPIRE Institute in Geneva, Ohio. This comes a day after weight thrower Jennifer Odoemene and long jumper Ja'Tae Joyner each brought home a silver medal.

            Amarys Berry claimed the Red Storm's first gold of the weekend, launching her shot put a career-best 14.67 meters. The junior's leading mark surpassed DePaul's Emily Eller by 0.02 meters to be crowned BIG EAST champion. Fellow Johnnies Samantha Morillo, Bernadette McGowan and Ashley Walsh completed the event in sixth, eighth and ninth, respectively.

            "Our ladies battled, from Berry's win in the shot put to winning the 4x400-meter relay in the last event," Head Coach Jim Hurt said. "I could not be more proud of our team's effort."

            The 4x400-meter relay squad of Torisha LaForce, Leah Anderson, Kafi Ottley, Skyy Diop captured the conference title with their best time of the season at 3:42.59. St. John's anchor Diop bolted around the final turn with DePaul's Kiersten Walker at her heels. The Red Storm's freshman staved off the charging Blue Demon, crossing the finish line 0.21 seconds faster than Walker to claim the Johnnies' second gold medal of the day.

            Rookie jumper Ja'Tae Joyner picked up her second silver of the weekend with a triple jump distance of 11.93 meters. The freshman standout earned 16 points for St. John's, second-most behind Leah Anderson (26). Senior Winona Peace also reached the finals in the discipline, posting an eighth-place mark of 11.11 meters.

            The only Johnnie to reach the podium on three occasions was sophomore sensation, Anderson. Both of her individual events, the 200-meter and 400-meter dashes, came down to a photo finish with Anderson snatching two silver medals and improving her third-place marks from 2018. The Mount Vernon, N.Y., native posted times of 24.21 and 54.51, respectively, giving the sprinter her fourth and fifth BIG EAST medals, before picking up her sixth in the 4x400-meter relay.

            Skyy Diop also ran in the 400-meter dash, recording a sixth-place time of 55.62. Destiny Davis added sixth-place marks of her own in 60-meter and 200-meter sprints, with respective times of 7.88 and 24.91. Torisha LaForce joined Davis and Anderson in the 200-meter dash, clocking a 25.60 time, good for seventh.

            The 4x800-meter team of Shannon Page, Stephanie Gerland, Kayla Parker and Jackie Gallagher rallied for their best time of the season at 10:00.09, over 17 seconds faster than the mark set at the TCNJ Lions Indoor Invitational.

            "It was fun to watch our team compete in all of our events this weekend but now we look forward to the ECAC Championships next week in Boston," said Coach Hurt.

            The Red Storm travels to Massachusetts for the ECAC Championships, held at the Boston University Track and Tennis Center on March 1-3.