Allen racks up indoor track titles, records

By

Sports

March 13, 2014 - 12:00 AM

NEW YORK — In what could best be compared to a last-second buzzer-beater to win a basketball game, Allen Community College’s Elesha Alyn did on the long jump ramp.
Alyn, who had been leading the women’s triple jump at the NJCAA Indoor National Championships in NYC, saw her mark passed twice as her competitors did their final leaps of the competition.
Fortunately, Alyn was slotted to jump last.
She soared 40 feet, 3  1/4 inches, good enough to shatter her own school record and earn her a national championship — the first in Allen history.
Meanwhile, teammate Terika Henry cemented her status as the most decorated in ACC history, also in breathtaking fashion.
Henry’s 60-meter dash title minutes after Alyn’s competition ended, was just as dramatic. She nipped Western Texas speedster Janet Amponsah at the line by four-one thousands of a second.
Henry’s time officially was 7.535 seconds; Amponsah’s was 7.539.
Allen head coach Vince DeGrado said Henry overcame a slow start by exploding over the last 10 meters to take the win.
Henry narrowly missed out on a second national championship. It was Amponsah’s turn to take the victory over Henry in the 200-meter dash.
Still, the history-making weekend for Allen — two national champions, a national runner-up, three NJCAA All-Americans, 16 Coaches Association All-Americans (going to the top six American finishers) and 12 new school records are further proof Allen is on the fast track to a legendary season.
Behind the work exclusively of Alyn, Henry and Vanessa Style, the Allen women took sixth as a team. Style also earned All-American status for her third-place finish in the 60-meter hurdles, running a school record 8.66 seconds. (It should be noted that Henry and Alyn also broke school records with their gold-medal works, as did Henry in her second-place finish in the 200.)
“They’ve all earned this recognition,” DeGrado said. “It’s all of them. We coaches are only as good or bad as our athletes are, and our athletes make us look good.
“It’s almost a little surreal hearing from coaches from major Division I universities to ask about our athletes. We got a call from the University of Nebraska this week. Tennessee is calling. It’s going to be cool to look at the end of the year to see where everybody is going.”

THE ALLEN MEN weren’t anything to sneeze at, either.
Brandon Bernal set a school record and finished second in the men’s 60-meter hurdles with his time of 7.94 seconds. A pair of Allen relays also earned top-six finishes.
The Red Devils’ 4×800-meter relay team of MeShach Adams, Markeen Caine, Dallas Snider and Thomas Broxterman teamed to finished fourth with a time of 7 minutes, 48.99 seconds — another school record.
Markeen Caine’s sixth-place finish in the 800-meter dash was done in a schol record 1:56.16. Had he not eclipsed the school mark, teammate Dallas Snider would have done so with his time of 1:56.85.
Bernal added to his hardware with his sixth-place finish in the 1000-meter run with a time of 2:29.11.
The Red Devils’ distance medley relay team of Tucker Morgan, Antonio Duncan, Broxterman and Bernal set a school record with their sixth-place time of 10:24.11.
Michael Burns finished seventh in the men’s triple jump at 48’1/2”.
“It’s fun to see this group of athletes do so well,” DeGrado said. “Every female athlete brought home something from nationals, and all but two men earned either a medal or a certificate.”
Not bad, particularly compared to last year’s team, which scored nary a point at nationals.
“Last year, we were bad indoors,” DeGrado said. “There’s no other way to say it. But we were able to pull it together for the outdoor season, and we still had a successful year.”
As a team, the Red Devil men finished 11th in the nation.
“I’m not sure where that ranks in Allen history, but it’s up there,” DeGrado said.
Now, the marks for indoor track have set a standard the athletes must meet in order for outdoor season to be similarly successful.
“Nothing is guaranteed,” he warned. “An athlete is only as good as his most recent race.”
DeGrado noted the men are on pace for an even more memorable season as the outdoor competition begins this weekend.
The Red Devils already have earned Jayhawk Conference Eastern Division championships in cross country and now indoor track.
“Winning the outdoor conference title would complete our triple crown,” DeGrado said. “That doesn’t just happen. That’s a sacred, holy grail type of accomplishment for a collegiate athlete.”
And as he has all season, DeGrado praised the work of assistant coach Tony Davis, who works with ACC’s sprinters and jumpers.
“This is only Tony’s and my second season together,” DeGrado said. “To have this kind of chemistry we have, this fast and this soon, it’s not normal. He shares the same vision of what I want our track and field program to be.”
So, while the outdoor season beckons — the athletes will be in Winfield today for the Southwestern Relays — the Red Devils will continue to train for the end of the season in mind.
“Those are the two meets that count the most,” he said. “Regionals and nationals. Last year, we were too busy chasing standards and numbers and we got away from how we should have been training. We have a training system in place now, and we’ve found our niche. I’m excited to see how this year progresses”
Allen’s individual results follow:
NJCAA National Indoor Championships
Men
60-meter dash: 26. DeAndre Simmons, 7.13 seconds; Roderick Simmons, 7.13 seconds
200-meter dash: 12. Simmons, 21.69 seconds; Simmons, 23.03
400-meter dash: 13. Zac McCoy, 49.26 seconds
600-meter dash: 19. Rickcardo Bailey, 1:22.20
800-meter dash: 6. Markeen Caine, 1:56.16 (S); 8. Dallas Snider, 1:56.85; 12. MeShach Adams, 1:58.25
1000-meter run: 6. Brandon Bernal, 2:29.11 (S); 16. Tucker Morgan, 2:35.80; 30. Snider, 2:43.37
1-mile run: 12. Bernal, 4:25.23
60-meter hurdles: 2. Bruce Barclay, 7.97 seconds (S); Rohan Mullings, 8.30 seconds
4×400-meter relay: 7. Allen (Bailey, McCoy, Kyle Smith, DeAndre Henderson), 3:16.08
4×800-meter relay: 4. Allen (Adams, Caine, Snider, Thomas Broxterman), 7:48.99 (S)
Distance medley relay: 6. Allen (Morgan, Antonio Duncan, Broxterman, Bernal), 10:24.11 (S)
Triple jump: 7. Michael Burns, 48’1/2”
Women
60-meter dash: 1. Terika Henry, 7.60 seconds (S)
200-meter dash: 2. Henry, 24.19 seconds (S); 15. Vanessa Style, 25.30 seconds
60-meter hurdles: 3. Vanessa Style, 8.72 seconds (S); 11. Elesha Alyn, 8.96 seconds
Triple jump: 1. Alyn, 40’3 1/4” (S)

Related
March 18, 2014
February 15, 2014
January 30, 2014
January 20, 2014