By Dan Canastra
In front of thousands of spectators, the Huskies put up a valiant effort at the Penn Relays last weekend.
The Penn Relays, which is the largest relay meet in the world, featured some of the best athletes and track programs in the country. Due to the thousands of athletes and schools participating in the meet, Northeastern was only able to compete in a few events.
The highlight of the meet for NU came from the team’s top two throwers, Vinny Tortorella and Derek Anderson.
Tortorella, a senior co-captain, captured a fourth place finish in the hammer throw with a distance of 202 feet. Anderson took a fifth place finish in the discus with a heave of 175’2″. The 4×100 team also had a good showing, finishing sixth in their heat.
Earning a fifth place finish, “was alright, it was pretty decent. I was looking for something a little better, although I can’t complain because it was the best competition I’ve seen since being in college,” said Anderson.
“I thought the men did well. I thought they ran and threw well,” said coach Sherman Hart. “I wasn’t really displeased with what they did. I felt the 4×100 and the 4×400 ran well. I thought that Vinny and Derek, with the exception of the shot put, did very well throughout the weekend.”
The keyword that Hart stressed over and over is ‘well.’ If something is done well it can always be done better, which is what the men will have to do this upcoming weekend at the America East Championship. The Huskies will have their work cut out for them when they try to regain the title they won just a year ago.
Hart noted that there are many teams eager and capable of winning the championship, but in particular Albany posts the biggest threat to take away the Huskies championship dream. Albany won the America East Championship last winter during the indoor season. Hart has confidence that his team can repeat as champions, but he knows it won’t be easy.
“We just have to come and be prepared. We really need to put stuff together for this meet,” said Hart. “We can’t come and not perform well. We’re going to have to perform at our very best. T9here are a lot of good teams out there which means we have to go out and put our ‘A’ game on.”
To rack up some extra points, and take some pressure away from the team, Anderson is going to throw the hammer (an event he normally doesn’t compete in) along with the discus and the shot put.
In order to win, Hart feels that the whole team has to show up and perform at the best of their capability. He emphasized that there cannot be anyone on the team that doesn’t perform at their best if they want to be successful.
To get prepared for the championship, Hart isn’t doing anything out of the ordinary.
“We’re basically going to do the things that work for us. There’s no point in changing at this point in time in the season,” said Hart. “We just have to continue to do the things that we’ve been doing all along and hopefully we’ll be successful.”
According to Hart, the team lacked attitude in the winter, which was a large factor as to why they weren’t as successful as they wanted to be. Only time will tell what kind of attitude the team brings this weekend as they try to repeat the same success they had a year ago in Orono, Maine at the America East Championship meet.
