After a 21-year drought, the men's track and field team captured a solo NESCAC title last year in a resounding, long-awaited individual win. This time around, however, saw a young Tufts team without one of the key cogs from last year's championship team, senior Graham Beutler, enter the meet as underdogs among a much tighter field. Not a point could be squandered en route to a second straight title, which was up for grabs until the very last events.
"We knew we were heavy underdogs going in with Graham [Beutler] out, and that's what drove every guy to bring it all day," senior tri-captain David Sutherland said.
"When Graham [Beutler] went down, it was hard, but rather than go into the next week with our heads down, we turned it on and the results showed that," senior Max Levitin added. "Every point counted and every person there, competitor or spectator, proved why Tufts track is a force to be reckoned with."
Marred by inclement weather, the meet, hosted by eventual fifth-place team Colby College, hardly appeared conducive to an extraordinary performance, but the statistics do not lie: 13 top-three finishes, scorers in 20 of 21 events, four individual conference titles and a slew of personal and season bests.
"This meet was a slugfest," Levitin said. "Middlebury and Tufts went toe-to-toe and battled for 11 hours in the worst weather Maine could offer. What we did as a team was unbelievable. People were beating their seeds all over the place."
The middle distance and throwing squads each contributed two conference titles apiece, spearheading Tufts' charge to a second title in as many years.
In the 800, sophomore Mitchell Black won in a season-best time of 1:50.84, currently second in the nation, while classmate Veer Bhalla crossed the line in 1:53.22 for a fourth-place finish. Senior tri-captain Jamie Norton outran the rest of the field in the 1,500 to took home the title in a time of 3:54.33.
The throwers collectively turned in perhaps their best performance in years, with juniors Atticus Swett and Brian Williamson taking home conference titles in the javelin and shot-put respectively - a first for both athletes.
Williamson, who broke his own school record of 52' 6" from last spring, now holds the 11th best throw in Div. III with his newly-minted record of 53' 1/4". Swett won the javelin with a throw of 175' 11", bolstered by freshman Nick Usoff in fifth and sophomore Alex Karys in seventh.
The dynamic duo also notched a pair of runner-up finishes - Swett in the discus and Williamson in the hammer throw. They both finished behind dual-event winner, junior Sean Enos of Bates, a three-time all-American and perennial contender across multiple throwing events.
However, it was the depth of Tufts, across both track and field events, that propelled the team to victory.
Freshman Jarad Asselin posted two season bests in the high jump and the triple jump, the highest Tufts finisher in both events. In the high jump, Asselin earned a fourth-place finish, as senior Andrew Osborne and freshman Thomas Wang tied for eighth. Asselin finished third in the triple jump as well, the only Jumbo to score in that event.
On the track, senior tri-captain Ben Wallis scored for Tufts in the 3,000-meter steeplechase, completing the event in 9:10.23, good enough for second place. In the longest event of the day, Norton padded his championship resume with a third-place finish in the 5,000, leaving him with two top-three finishes on the day.
As the meet continued to wear on, the team received a huge boost from its pole vaulters, who went into the competition as heavy underdogs. Instead, Tufts received points from four vaulters: Sutherland, senior Trevor Rothaus, freshman Pietro Possenti and junior Mitch Stallman.
"We didn't know what to expect [from the pole vaulters]," freshman Blake Coolidge said. "They've had an interesting season with injuries, and no-heighting at certain meets, so we really didn't know what to expect. But they made a huge push, with four guys getting into the top eight. It was a huge momentum swing ... I think our coach [thought] they would get like six points, and instead they got [16 points].
Despite the impressive individual performances, Tufts had not yet pulled away from Middlebury by the time the relay competitions had begun. After sophomore Francis Goins, who finished third in the 400 and seventh in the 200, had primed Tufts for a run at the title, the relays would decide the victor.
Goins anchored both the 4x400-meter and 4x100-meter relay teams, which recorded season bests and finished second and third, respectively. The foursomes of Coolidge, sophomore Bryson Hoover-Hankerson, Osborne and Goins in the 4x100 and of sophomore Woody Butler, sophomore Alex Kasemir, Usoff and Goins in the 4x400, ultimately put Tufts in a winning position as the meet neared its conclusion.
"We showed up knowing that every point would count and it wasn't until before the last relay that we knew we a clinched the win," Sutherland said.
Despite its flair for the dramatic, Tufts secured the win and cemented its position as the team to beat in one of the toughest conferences in the country.
"Tufts is building a reputation for finding an entirely new level come NESCACs and hopefully other teams are learning that if they want to compete for the NESCAC title they need to bring their 'A game' all day without fail, because that is what Tufts has done the past two years and will continue to in years to come," Sutherland said.
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