Temple University track and field began the 2020 portion of its indoor season on Saturday at the Penn 8-Team Select at the Ocean Breeze Athletic Complex in Staten Island, N.Y.
Coach Elvis Forde said that he “wasn’t ecstatic” with his team’s performance, but he’ll take it because the team only had five days to prepare for the meet after the holiday break ended.
“It could’ve been better in some situations in regards to how we performed,” Forde said. “But when I look at the number of days that we’ve had training and how our athletes performed, I’m not going to say I’m ecstatic about it, but I gotta understand and make sure what we did based on the time that we’ve had to prepare for this meet. Overall, we got a B minus and I’ll take that and build upon it for the next couple of weeks.”
Junior sprinter Sydney Williams ran a time of 9.06 seconds in the 60-meter hurdles to advance to the finals. She ran 9.04 seconds in the finals to finish in sixth place.
Senior Millie Howard made her indoor season debut in the 1600-meter event. She finished in first place with a time of four minutes, 51.01 seconds.
Senior Grace Moore finished in fifth place in the 1600-meter with a time of four minutes, 53.01 seconds.
Redshirt-senior Alanna Lally won the 800-meter with a time of two minutes, 13.91 seconds. Junior Helene Gottlieb finished in third in the event with a time of two minutes, 14.45 seconds.
“She had a good day, but she’s still finding her wheels because, again, of the long layoff,” Forde said. “Because all of the middle distance kids are ahead of the sprinters because the distance kids can just go out and run but the sprinters need more of a facility. She’s moving fast, but can go faster and train harder now that she’s back. But that just comes with time.”
Moore, Howard and Gottlieb all finished in the top five for the Owls in the 3000-meter. Moore finished in second place with a time of nine minutes, 48.45 seconds, Howard in third place with a time of nine minutes, 51 seconds, and Gottlieb finished in fifth place with a time of 10 minutes, 06.56 seconds.
Lally, sophomore Marissa White, and juniors Mikaela Vlasic and Mallorie Smith helped the Owls finish in fifth place in the 4×400-meter relay with an overall time of 3 minutes, 55.89 seconds.
The Owls will be back in action on Jan. 24 and 25 in the Bronx, N.Y. at the Dr. Sanders Columbia Challenge.
“We’re gonna ramp up the training in the next few days because the next competition is a very special one,” Forde said. “We want to put our best foot forward for it.”
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