Kirkpatrick |
Baldasare |
Cooney |
Zawalich |
Team honored after posting All-America finish at NCAA Championships
EASTON, Mass. (March 18, 2014) – Stonehill College's men's 4000-meter distance medley relay team, which posted an All-America performance at the NCAA Division II Indoor Track & Field Championships over the weekend, has been named the Northeast-10 Conference Relay of the Week by the league office.
Stonehill's distance medley relay team highlighted the weekend for the Skyhawks, which featured a program record 12 combined men's and women's student-athletes to make the trip to the national meet. Stonehill finished seventh out of 12 entries in the DMR with a time of 9:58.33 to earn All-America honors for the sixth time in the last eight years. Sophomore Nick Kirkpatrick (Carmel, Ind./Brebeuf Jesuit Prep) led off with a 3:07.71 split in the opening 1200-meter leg, and then handed the baton to freshman Matt Baldasare (Mansfield, Mass./Mansfield), who completed the 400-meter leg in 49.69-seconds – the fifth-fastest split for that leg. Junior All-American Patrick Cooney (Douglaston, N.Y./Archbishop Molloy) ran the 800-meter leg in 1:53.45, third fastest in the field, and then junior All-American Daniel Zawalich (Paxton, Mass./Saint John's of Shrewsbury) finished the one mile anchor leg in 4:07.37 – fourth fastest on the night.
Cooney and Zawalich earn All-America honors for the second time in their career after they were part of Stonehill's 2012 DMR that finished sixth (10:04.69) in Mankato, Minn. Stonehill was first among the two Northeast-10 Conference entries in the race as American International College finished 12th in 10:41.16.
It marks the fifth Relay of the Week award for the men's track and field program this year and the third time the distance medley relay has earned the honors. In addition to previous DMR weekly awards on February 3 and 11, the men's 4x800-meter relay was named Relay of the Week on January 20 and the 4x400-meter relay collected the award on December 11. Cooney and Kirkpatrick have been part of all three DMR weekly honors as well as the 4x800 relay of the week. Zawalich has been on all three DMRs that have collected the weekly award, while Baldasare has been a member of two of the DMRs as well as the 4x400. Cooney has also been named Track Athlete of the Week once this season (February 10) and Baldasare has been named Track Rookie of the Week once (February 10).
Stonehill, ranked second in the most recent USTFCCCA Division II East Regional computer rankings, opens its outdoor season this Saturday when it competes at the BSU Bears Invitational at Bridgewater State University at 9 a.m.
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