Point Park Men's Track & Field tunes up at RMU prior to RSC Championship

NEVILLE ISLAND, Pa. -- Point Park University men's track and field got its final tuneup before he River States Conference meet at the RMU Benson/Hodge Memorial Invitational on Friday. The Pioneers put forth many PRs to get ready for the RSC Outdoor Track & Field Championships that they are hosting at the same venue of the P3R Track & Field Complex on April 25-26. 

Jakob Blatnik was a big perfomer on the day as his victory in the javelin put him fourth in the NAIA national rankings. Blatnik, an NAIA All-American in the event, threw a season-best of 66.87 meters for first place. That is first in the RSC going into the conference meet and once again hit the NAIA A national-qualifying mark. 

The javelin was a big event for Point Park with five competitors. Ben Blahovec threw 48.89 meters for second place followed by David Attram 45.34, Nasir Galloway 43.86 and Anthony Billy 36.32. 

Chevaughn Fletcher won the shot put and hammer throw to continue the throws success. He tossed 15.12 in the shot put with Attram coming in third at 13.45. In the hammer, Fletcher won at 46.74 meters with Attram registering a PR of 42.28 meters for third. Attram was in all four throws events, and he led the Pioneers in the discus at 32.84 meters for seventh place. 

Kanye Mills and Gavin Glass controlled the hurdle events on the day. They placed 1-2 in both the 110 and 400 hurdles. Mills ran 15.09 in the 110 hurdles with Glass coming in at 15.80 for a PR. The 400 hurdles had Mills run 57.48 and Glass produce another PR of 59.67.

Point Park was also on top in the jumping events. Akeem Mustapha won the long and high jumps, and Xavier Tolliver won the triple jump. Mustapha hit 1.80 meters in the high jump and won the long at 6.85 meters. Tolliver's win in the triple came at 13.07 meters for a PR.

Maxwwell Goode was second in both the long and triple jumps registering marks of 6.46 and 12.92 meters, respectively. Tolliver was third in the long with a distance of 6.22 meters. 

Juan Barrera and Tyler Hare each registered a PR in the 100 meters. Barrera was third at 11.10 seconds with Hare fourth at 11.14 seconds. Emmanual Akpoli had another PR in the sprints running 23.91 for 10th place in the 200.

Elijah James placed second in the 800 meters running 1:54.22. Akpoli had a second PR there running 2:09. Toby Wright led the Pioneers in the 400 meters with a time of 52.51 seconds for third place. A final PR on the track was John Dyar running the 1,500 meters in 4:26. 

Point Park placed first in the 4x100 relay with Hare, Damir Lomax, Barrera and Mustapha teaming up. They posted a time of 42.66 seconds.