Before getting its "Last Chance" at qualifying for NCAAs, the women's track and field team had some business to take care of at ECACs and Open New Englands.
With the May 27-29 NCAA National Championships rapidly approaching, the women's track and field team was focused on earning or improving NCAA qualifying marks. As of press time, six Jumbos held provisional qualifying marks (results from Friday's Last Chance Meet at MIT were not yet available).
Several Jumbos improved their marks at the ECAC Div. III Championships held from May 13 to 14 at Springfield, as the team earned 47 points for a fifth-place finish out of 51 teams in a meet showcasing some of the best talent in the region.
Rising sophomore Kelly Allen earned her fourth throwing title of the season when she came in first in the discus with a throw of 142'3". She also came in fourth in the shot put with a launch of 40'9.75".
The Jumbos, additionally, earned 14 total points in the triple jump, led by rising senior Kanku Kabongo, who posted an NCAA provisional qualifying mark in the triple jump with her season-best of 38' 11.75". She earned eight points for Tufts in the overall team standings after finishing second behind Springfield graduating senior Nikki Hay.
Rising junior Nakeisha Jones, who came in third at last year's NCAA National Championships in the triple jump, finished third in the same event at the ECAC Championships with her leap of 38'2". Rising junior Dayorsha Collins jumped 5'4.25" in the high jump, earning her a fourth-place finish, and rising senior Amy Wilfert also delivered a top-five performance, improving her time in the 1,500-meter to 4:36.80. Wilfert narrowly missed qualifying for the finals in the 1,500 at last year's NCAAs.
"The team had a lot of injuries this season. I had some injuries also. But people stepped up, and [the team] was pretty successful," Kabongo said. "People performed surprisingly well at the ECACs. It was great to be in the top five teams. Everyone was really peaking at the right times this season."
From May 7-9, Tufts headed to Northeastern for the Open New England Championships, where five Jumbos scored points for the team in a meet primarily for posting NCAA-qualifying marks.
Tufts earned 22 points overall, giving it a 14th-place finish out of 39 teams. Wilfert and graduating senior co-captain Andrea Ferri both ran qualifying times in their respective events — the 400-meter hurdles and the 1,500-meter run. Ferri finished under the NCAA time of 1:04.2 in the preliminaries with a time of 1:03.86 and ultimately placed eighth in the finals, scoring one point for the Jumbos with her time of 1:05.34. Wilfert improved her previous qualifying time by 0.57, finishing with a time of 4:37.56.
Other Tufts highlights came from Jones and Allen, each of whom earned six points for the team with third-place finishes. Jones jumped 38'3.5" in the triple jump, and Allen had a 141-foot, 11-inch launch in the discus. Though both distances are NCAA qualifiers, Jones and Allen had both earned better marks earlier in the season.
Tufts had fourth- and fifth-place finishes in the 10,000-meter run, bringing in nine points. Rising sophomore Lilly Fisher ran 39:04.30 for a fourth-place finish, with rising junior Sadie Lansdale close behind in fifth place with a time of 39:44.22.
Ferri, Wilfert, Jones, Allen, Kabongo and Collins have all provisionally qualified for the NCAAs, which will be held at Baldwin-Wallace College starting on May 27. For those six Jumbos, they can only wait to see whether or not they make the sport's biggest stage.
"It's close, whether or not we make it to the NCAAs, so we're focused on trying to improve our marks as much as we can," Allen said. "We're all getting really excited. We want to make it, but anything can happen. As a team, we're on our way to peaking, and we can build on how we have done in the last two weeks at the Opens and the ECACs."
