By Alex Boggis, UT Martin Assistant Sports Information Director
BIRMINGHAM, Ala. – Behind a pair of impressive performance in the relay events and standout individual performances, the University of Tennessee at Martin men’s track and field program finished fourth at the 2022 Ohio Valley Conference Indoor Track and Field Championships for its best performance in school history.
The Skyhawk men’s program finished fourth amongst OVC squads with 73 total points while the women’s team came in ninth with four points. Southeast Missouri won the men’s team title with 198 points, edging Eastern Illinois by a narrow 1.5 margin. Meanwhile, Murray State claimed the women’s championship with 139 points.
In addition to the Skyhawks team success, UT Martin standout Darius Holland was honored after the championship as the league’s OVC Male Co-Freshman of the Year after his season of accomplishments. Along with rewriting program records throughout his career in both the long jump and triple jump, he scored 10 points combined in both events during the championship. His best leap of 7.34 meters on Wednesday finished in fourth place to claim five points for the team before he broke his own triple jump record again on Thursday to finish fourth with a distance of 14.11 meters.
The Skyhawks added three more points a little later on Wednesday afternoon as Will Oglesby paced the men’s team in the 5k. The senior recorded a time of 14:54.77 to earn the team three points and finish sixth in the field.
UT Martin stole the show with its first big relay performance on Wednesday evening. After entering the championship with the best Distance Medley Relay team in the league, the Skyhawks lived up to that billing in Birmingham. The quartet of Cole Davis, John Collin Askew, Andre Brown and Luke McNair strung together a championship performance with a time of 10.05.75 to claim 10 points.
The Skyhawk women also got on the board with their DMR squad of Rita Eimer, Sanaa Smith, Blayne Lachance and Lilia Alvarez. The group finished seventh overall with a time of 12:35.15 but still claimed two points.
Thursday’s performance began with UT Martin’s men competing in the mile run. The duo of Cole Davis and Luke McNair combined to score three points for the Skyhawks as Davis finished seventh with a time of 4:15.22 while McNair came in right behind at 4:19.31.
UT Martin reached the podium for the first time once the hurdles came out. After medaling in both 2019 and 2020, junior Brady Fry looked to continue that streak in the men’s 60m hurdles and did just that. Fry narrowly missed out on his second championship, finishing runner-up with a time of 8.31 seconds.
The points kept rolling in for the men in the 400m dash as Askew finished fifth with a time of 49.49 while fellow freshman Khalid White posted a time of 50.15 to come in seventh.
Freshman dual-sport athlete JaMichael McGoy also earned the Skyhawks two points with his seventh place finish in the men’s 60m dash with a time of 7.05 seconds. Meanwhile, JayleAna Wyatt also added two points for the women’s squad in the 60m dash with a mark of 7.91 seconds.
UT Martin nearly put to athletes on the podium in the men’s 800m as Hawken Foote and Andre Brown finished back-to-back in third and fourth. Foote claimed the podium finish with a late push with a time of 1:54.03 while Brown was nipping on his heels at 1:54.14.
The Skyhawks claimed their final points as individuals in the men’s 3k as freshman Will Cahill used a late push to finish second in the event with a time of 8:20.21 for a new personal record. Oglesby came back for the second distance meet in as many days to sneak onto the point leaderboard with an eight-place finish at 8:33.94.
Last but not least, UT Martin had some late fireworks left in them in the men’s 4x400m relays. The Skyhawk group of Maluke Cluver, Askew, Brown and Foote ran with the best in the league and finished third by just 0.02 seconds over SIUE with a time of 3:20.17 for a new school-record.
With a wrap on the indoor season, UT Martin will open its outdoor campaign on Friday, March 25-26 at the Margaret Simmons Invite hosted by Murray State.
Graphic Courtesy of UT Martin Sports Information