JMU Places Third At ECAC Indoor Championships

Friday, March 4

Boston, Mass.

All Day

James Madison University

ECAC Indoor Championships

3/6/2016 2:48:00 PM | Track & Field

BOSTON, Mass. - James Madison produced several more historic performances to tie for third place out of 44 teams on the third and final day of the 2016 Eastern College Athletic Association (ECAC) Indoor Championships, hosted at the Boston University Track & Tennis Center on Sunday.

Heading into the day with a slight lead on the field, the Dukes battled hard and came away with 48 total points, tying St. John's score and sitting just behind Albany (48.5). Connecticut earned 62 points to take home the trophy for the fourth consecutive year and for the eighth time in the last 10 years.

"It was an excellent performance from the entire team; we really built on the momentum from yesterday," said Head Coach Chereé Hicks. "We had another first-place finish today and some great times from Carol in the mile and the distance medley team. I'm really proud of how we competed this weekend."

Highlighting the day for JMU was graduate student Amber Monroe, who secured a vital 10 points for the Dukes by taking first in the shot put with a throw of 15.77 meters. The win capped a steller indoor season in which the JMU newcomer broke the school record for indoor shot put four separate times and took home first place at five meets. Monroe earned the second gold medal for the Dukes this weekend, following Ebony Owusu-Sampah's victory in the long jump on Saturday.

The Dukes' distance medley relay team of Erica Gray, Tyrah Burrow, Erica Jackson and Olivia Viparina got the day started strong with a second-place finish out of 23 teams. The quartet completed the relay with a time of 11:40.70, an effort which ranks eighth on the JMU all-time top-10 list. The team is the first to make a new entry on the list since the 2002 season.

Also building on that strong start was junior Carol Strock, who ran a 4:55.83 in Saturday's one-mile run preliminaries before topping it on Sunday with a personal record time of 4:49.11 to place third out of nine runners in the finals. The time tops her previous PR of 4:54.45, which was set at the 2015 Sykes & Sabock Challenge Cup and moves her from 10th to fifth on the JMU top-10 list.

Sophomore Aereale Scott also competed after advancing past Saturday's prelims. The Dallas, Texas native ran an 8.75 in the 60-meter hurdles finals and a 7.77 in the 60-meter dash finals to help the Dukes on the final day of competition.

James Madison will have a week off and then get right back to work as the 2016 outdoor season begins with the Virginia Cup on Saturday, Mar. 19.

PREVIOUS RECAPS
A full recap of Friday night's pentathlon can be found here and the recap of Saturday's full slate of events is available here.

UP NEXT
The Dukes also opened outdoor season with the University of Virginia-hosted Virginia Cup last year. Then-sophomore De'Ana Forbes registered an ECAC-qualifying mark of 14.14 seconds to win the 100-meter hurdles to highlight the day.