ASU track and field was outpaced in their first national meet of the season Saturday, finishing fourth on the women’s side (63.5 points) and fifth on the men’s side (46 points).
The Texas A&M Aggie Invitational featured seven Division I programs Saturday afternoon in College Station, Texas.
“I told the team that the key thing right now is to continue making progress,” head coach Greg Kraft said. “The way we look at it is we want to see constant improvement each week. I believe we saw that today.”
The Texas A&M team – which checks in at first in men’s and fifth in women’s on the USTFCCCA national rankings – won the meet, with the men tallying 150 points and the women putting up 184.
Finishing second on the men’s side was No. 10 Texas Tech, followed by No. 6 Georgia. However, the tenth-ranked Georgia women finished second above No. 19 Texas Tech, which finished third.
“As the season goes on, we’ll continue adding pieces to the puzzle,” Kraft said. “For example, we added TCU transfer Christine Williford this week, and we were light years better this week on the women’s 4x100."
One of the highlights for the ASU women’s team came when redshirt junior Maggie Ewen not only finished first in the women’s shot put but also broke a meet record with her throw of 17.05 meters. Ewen continued her dominance in the women’s weight throw, where she finished second with a throw of 20.34 meters.
MEET RECORD! @MagdalynMaeEwen breaks the Texas A&M Aggie Invite shot put record with a toss of 17.05m (55-11¼ )! pic.twitter.com/1mEowGr93F
— SunDevilTFXC (@SunDevilTFXC) January 21, 2017
"We have good balance on the men’s side while the women will continue to learn what competing at this level is. Today may not have been a spectacular effort, but we’re making progress,” Kraft said.
Redshirt sophomore John Reniewicki finished second in a field of 18 runners in the 3000-meter event with a time of 8:15.67. This is Reniewicki’s first time competing in the 3K, but if this performance is any indication of what is to come, fans can expect to see a lot more of him in the event this season.
The Sun Devils will be back in action on Feb. 3 in Lincoln, Nebraska, for the Husker Invitational.
