ALBANY, N.Y. – A false start in week one rolls over to the University at Albany track & field program finally making its return to competition this weekend with two meets, at USF and Fordham.
 
Meet Info
USF Bulls Invitational (March 19-20)
Live Results | Schedule | Heat Sheets
 
Fordham CO-VID Invitational (March 20)
Heat Sheets
 
Bulls Invitational Entries (W/M)
 
100m: Clarke, Lowe, Matthew / Blake, Casab, S. Williams
200m: Clarke, Lowe, Matthew / Blake, Gutierrez Almedina
400m: Denis / X
100m/110m HH: Jinks / D. Williams
400m IH: Denis, Jinks / X
4x100m: Clarke, Denis, Jinks, Lowe, Matthew / Blake, Casab, Gutierrez Almedina, S. Williams
4x400m: Clarke, Denis, Jinks, Lowe, Matthew / X
HJ: Bailey / Gordon
LJ: Onah / X
TJ: X / Blue, Sturdivant
SP: Bigsby, Scott / Robinson
DT: Scott / Robinson
HT: Campos / X
JT: X / Mitchell
 
Fordham Invitational Entries (W/M)
 
100m: Chartier, Magassouba, Osei-Boateng, Waugh / Dixon, Hermance, Umuhuza
200m: Chartier, Gray, Magassouba, Osei-Boateng, Payne, Their / Dixon, Hermance, Rosenthal
400m: X / Napier, Reagan
800m: Butterfield, Coddington, Quarshie, Rutt / Athanailos, Greenwood
1,500m: Chambers, Hayes, Riorden, Sherman / Beltran, Menis, Rogalski
5,000m: Guilfoyle, Ka. Iocca, Planavsky / Garcia, Kiptum, Ramdani
100m/110m HH: Calamunci, Thier / X
400m IH: DeFilippis / X
4x400m: Butterfield, Hayes, Quarshie, Rutt / Athanailos, Beltran, Greenwood, Heatley, Jack, Mancabelli, Meehan, Rogalski
4x800m: Coddington, Guilfoyle, Ka. Iocca, Riorden / Garcia, Kiptum, Menis, Ramdani
PV: Martinez / Baker, Heatley, McDonough
HJ: X / Meehan
LJ: Foster, Omekeni / Edwards
TJ: Addario, Barrientos Alpha / X
SP: X / Blatche, Reid
JT: Collins, Payne / Blatche, Heintzelman, Jack, Mancabelli, Meehan
 
Leading the Pack

• The UAlbany track & field program saw its 2020 outdoor and 2021 indoor seasons cancelled due to COVID-19
• Saturday will be UAlbany's first meet since the 2020 IC4A and ECAC Indoor Championships more than a year ago
• UAlbany returns a total of eight individual champions from the 2019 conference meet
• UAlbany has home meets scheduled for April 15-16 and May 7.  America East Outdoor Championships are May 1-2 at UMass Lowell.
• Fordham's CO-VID Invitational will be held at famed Icahn Stadium on Randalls Island in New York City.

 
Last Time Out
UAlbany participated in an abbreviated spring cross country season to make up for the fall season's cancellation due to COVID-19.  After one regular-season meet in Vermont, the team raced at the America East XC Championships, with the women placing sixth overall and the men placing eighth.  Kelly Iocca placed ninth in the women's race, earning All-Conference Second Team honors.  The last track & field meet for UAlbany was the 2020 IC4A and ECAC Indoor Championships, where the men and women both placed third behind six total event victories, including Louis Gordon in the men's high jump, EJ Onah in the women's long jump, Asia Jinks in the women's 60m hurdles, Garfield Napier in the men's 60m, Myles Banfield in the men's 400m, and Jan Michael Gutierrez Almedina in the men's 200m.
 
Defending America East Outdoor Champions
In 2019, for the 11th-straight season, the UAlbany track & field program swept the America East Outdoor team titles.  The women set a program record, winning 10 individual events to score a record 254 points and cap off the first women's Triple Crown in America East history.  The men won nine events and scored 214.5 points, marking their 15th-straight team title.
 
Returning Individual America East Outdoor Champions (2019)

• Jan Michael Gutierrez Almedina: 200m, 4x100m, 4x400m
• Asia Jinks: 400m IH
• Chidinma Matthew: 100m, 200m
• Garfield Napier: 100m, 4x100m
• Bryan Nicholson: Discus
• Alexandria Payne: Heptathlon
• EJ Onah: Long Jump
• Cara Sherman: 10,000m

 
America East Outdoor History
The UAlbany track & field program has swept the team titles at the America East Outdoor Championships each season from 2009-19, before the 2020 championship meet was cancelled due to COVID-19.  The women have won the team title 13 times, including each of the las 11, and the men have won 16, including each of the last 15.  Since joining the America East, UAlbany has claimed 217 total event titles.  The men have won 126, including 76 track and 50 field events, and the women have won 91, including 59 track and 32 field.  The men won a program-record 11 titles in 2007 and 2009, and won nine in the most recent championship meet in 2019.  The women set their record of 10 event titles in the 2019 championship meet.  The women's most successful event has been the 100m and 400m hurdles, with Great Danes winning those events 10 times each.  The men boast the highest number of event titles in the triple jump, winning 14 times.  Currently, UAlbany holds four women's championship meet records and five men's.
 
Championship Pedigree
The UAlbany track & field and cross country program won its first America East title in 2003 when the men broke through to claim the indoor track team championship.  Since then, each of the six programs has won at least one America East crown, with women's cross country winning its first in 2018 as the final team to join the group of title-winners.  Overall, the program's six teams have collectively won 57 of UAlbany 118 conference titles in the Division I era, through the end of the winter 2020-21 season.  The men have won 16 indoor and outdoor titles each, the most in the program, followed by women's outdoor with 13, women's indoor with 10, and men's and women's cross country with one each.
 
Olympic Dreams
In 2016, UAlbany sprinter/hurdler Grace Claxton qualified for the semifinal round at the Olympic Games in Rio.  Competing for her native Puerto Rico, Claxton placed 14th overall in the event in a personal-best time 55.90.  She continues her Olympic training, gearing up for another run at the Tokyo Games, to be held this summer after a one-year delay.  Claxton headlines a small group of hopefuls with UAlbany connections training for an Olympic push, including:
 

• Grace Claxton – Puerto Rico
• Ricardo Estremera – Puerto Rico
• Abel Gilet – Haiti
• Venique Harris – Jamaica
• Adrian Mitchell – Jamaica
• Diamond Thomas – Trinidad and Tobago

 
Reverse Jinks
In her first two meets of 2020, hurdler Asia Jinks improved her time in the 60m hurdles to 8.45 through the early part of the season, jumping to third-best in program history.  Jinks raced in the hurdles four times in January, in trials and finals at each meet, and set a new personal-best in three of the four races.  At the Great Dane Classic, with an existing personal-best of 8.60, Jinks hit 8.52 in the trials and 8.51 in the finals.  At the Dr. Sander Columbia Challenge, Jinks ran 8.53 in the trials before unleashing her current best, 8.45, in the finals.  By the end of the 2019-20 indoor season, Jinks owned each of the fastest 13 hurdles times in the America East.
 
21
When he won the 2020 America East Indoor 200m championship, Jan Michael Gutierrez crossed the line in 20.98, becoming the first Great Dane in history to break the 21.00 barrier outright.  Gutierrez Almedina previously ran a wind-aided 20.95 during the 2019 outdoor season.  In his career, he has won six America East event titles.
 
Dashing
The men's 100m dash record was set at the 2019 America East Outdoor Championships when Garfield Napier qualified first in the preliminary round in 10.54.  Not to be outdone, on the women's side, Chidinma Matthew has won seven America East even titles, including each of the three most recent short sprints.
 
Yo, Adrian!
Adrian Mitchell makes his return to active competition this season, having not competed for UAlbany since the 2018 outdoor season.  Mitchell burst onto the scene with the second-best javelin mark in program history in his first season, 227-02.00, back in 2016.  That same year he earned All-America Second Team honors in his signature event, placing 14th at NCAA Outdoor Championships.
 
50
Only two women have hit the 50' mark in the shot put in program history.  Tara Belinsky hit it first, and remains the only woman to throw that far in both the indoor and outdoor events.  During the indoor 2020 season, Shelby Bigsby surpassed Belinsky's indoor record of 50-00.00 by nearly five inches, becoming the second woman to hit or exceed a 50' shot put mark.  Bigsby did not get a chance to carry her momentum to the outdoor season, which was cancelled due to COVID-19.
 
Long Jumping
Junior EJ Onah remains undefeated in America East championship meets in her signature event, the long jump.  Announcing her presence as a freshman by winning the long jump at the 2019 America East Indoor Championships, Onah has successfully defended her inaugural victory at each of the following two conference championship meets held since then.  She has recorded marks exceeding 20-00.00 both indoors and outdoors.
 
Go the Distance
Cara Sherman returns to the Great Danes' squad this season as a graduate student and the women's top distance runner.  Sherman, who is an 11-time All-America East performer, is the defending America East 10,000m champion, an event she won on her home track in 2019.  She ranks no lower than fourth in all of the indoor and outdoor long-distance events in UAlbany history.
 
Continued Excellence
The UAlbany men have a stellar recent history in the high jump, featuring three overlapping student-athletes, Alex Bowen, Matthew Campbell, and Kingsley Ogbonna, who each cleared 7-00.00 in the event.  After they had all exhausted their eligibility, a new jumper joined the program.  Louis Gordon became the fourth Great Dane in history to clear 7-00.00 in the high jump, recording a season-best 7-02.25 to win the 2020 America East Indoor Championships as a freshman.
 
Triple Crown
After winning the 2018-19 America East XC team title, the UAlbany women went on to claim team victories in the America East Indoor and Outdoor Championship meets, becoming the first women's program in conference history to win all three titles in the same academic year.  Previously, the 2011-12 UAlbany men and 1988-89 Northeastern men had claimed the Triple Crown.
 
Next: UAlbany visits the University of Virginia for the Virginia Invitational on April 2-3.