By Dan Canastra
Northeastern looked to win its third straight America East title last weekend, but fell short to Albany, who scored a meet record 230 points.
The Huskies had a slim lead over Albany after the first day of competition (Saturday). Coach Sherman Hart felt that Albany benefited from the lack of competition in the meet.
“All the other teams could have shown up to the meet,” Hart said. “What really hurt is that it was almost like a duel meet, and Albany has many more bodies than we do. We can’t go into a duel meet against Albany. If every team showed up to compete we probably would have won the meet, or come much closer.”
Northeastern, who scored 158 points in the meet, saw their closest competitor over 50 points in the distance.
Despite not winning their third straight America East title, Hart was proud of his team’s performance last weekend.
“I thought they performed extremely well,” said Hart. “They came to compete this weekend. I have no qualms, issues or problems with the way they performed last weekend. They brought loads and loads of attitude. They left nothing out there; they gave us everything they had.”
Senior co-captain Vinny Tortorella was the star of the weekend for the Huskies. He defended his title in the hammer throw (62.2 meters) from a year ago, and also finished second in the discus (50.66) and third in the shot put (15.62). These accomplishments earned him “Most Outstanding Field Performer” honors in his last ever America East Championship.
“I was honored [to win most outstanding field performer],” he said. “I was doing what I could to help the team. We came up short because we didn’t have the numbers that Albany had, but we had some quality performances.”
The team’s other top thrower, sophomore sensation Derek Anderson, topped the competition in both the shot put (16.5 meters) and discus (52.34). He also received a fourth place finish in the hammer throw. Winning the shot and discus, “was alright. I felt a little better with shot than the discus,” according to Anderson.
“The same thing happened as every other meet, I hoped to improve and throw farther,” he said. “I’m not complaining. I’m just hoping to do some things with the bigger meets in the upcoming weeks.”
Junior Adam Crossman retained his javelin title from a year ago with a toss of 59.8 meters.
Sophomore sprinter Idris Payne had an exceptional weekend. He won the 200-meter race (21.81 seconds) and finished fourth in the 400 (48.24).
The Huskies dominated the pole vault throughout the weekend. Ryan Cahill successfully defended his title from a year ago (4.56 meters), while right behind him were teammates Brian Stieg (4.56), Aaron Hill (4.56) and Dave Wilkes (4.41) who finished second, fourth and sixth respectively. The team racked up 26 points from the event.
This weekend the Huskies are competing at the New England Championships in Durham, New Hampshire. With the team coming off a grueling weekend at the America East Championship, Hart is planning on resting some of the team’s top performers. The men will look to be competitive this weekend while getting ready for the IC4A Championship and the NCAA East Regional both coming up later in May.
