Bluestone News

26 new school records, five nationally ranked performances highlight B-State’s Track and Field Opener in Louisville

 The Bluefield State indoor track and field teams established or broke 26 school records Saturday at the Commonwealth Collegiate Opener in Louisville, KY, and B-State athletes are ranked among the top 50 nationally in five events following the opening weekend of NCAA Division II competition. 

Eleven Big Blue competitors placed among the top eight in their events at the unscored meet, which featured 19 teams including nationally ranked Division I opponents Texas and Kentucky. 

Triple jumpers Darius Brown (24th) and Raelyn Vadala (41st), the women's 4X400-meter relay team (36th), and Emma Flynn (42nd, 1 mile run; 31st, 3000m run) are each ranked among the top 50 NCAA Division II competitors following the first week of competition. B-State's athletes will now break for the holiday season and return to campus in January to resume the 2022-2023 campaign. 

"This was a great start for us," said B-State Head Coach Brooks Rexroat. "We learned a lot about ourselves and have some great initial data to fine-tune training. Most importantly, though, our young team now has a great sense of what elite collegiate track and field looks like and a better idea of what it takes to get to the level that all of us want to reach. There's a lot of potential to grow, and that's the most encouraging part of this week's competition: we went out at showed we belong, but we know we're just scratching the surface of what this group can do." 

Freshman Kellie Williams placed in a pair of events to lead the women's squad, while McKinley Pennix and Austin Sigman paced the men's squad, each earning a pair of top-eight finishes. 

Williams claimed the best finish on the day for the B-State women, placing second in the 800m run after finishing sixth in the 600m run earlier in the day.  

Kayla Havens sprinted to a fourth-place finish in the women's 500m run, an event that was won by 12-time NCAA Division I All-American and 2022 World Championship bronze medalist Kennedy Simon of Texas. 

Emma Flynn picked up where she left off after her strong debut campaign for the B-State cross country squad: she finished sixth in the women's mile run and set a school record mark in the event—her fourth program-best mark on the year, including cross country school records at three race distances. 

B-State sent five athletes to the line in the 60m hurdles, and the quintet acquitted themselves well in a field that included 11-NCAA Division I all-American and 2022 U.S.A. Outdoor National Championships finalist Massai Russel of Kentucky. Khrisalyn Kegler paced the B-State group, which also included Havens, Vadala, Nikki Walker, and Arianna Wickliff. 

In the women's 60-meter dash, Trinity Blue advanced to the semifinals, where she turned in a new B-State record of 8.11 seconds. Blue also set a new B-State standard in the 300m dash later in the day and contributed to the B-State relay team. Shreya Chakraborty joined Blue in the 60m dash field. 

Beyonka Lee's career debut in the weight throw turned into a top-15 finish and new school record, and she was followed closely by teammate Oliviah Green in the weight as well as in the shot put. 

"Our ladies had a tremendous day," Rexroat said. "We like where we are right now. We're putting together good performances in every event area. Our throwers had a really nice day, and I'm ecstatic for Kellie and the performance she was able to put together. Emma continued her strong work, and Trinity overcame some nerves to put together a nice day. Arianna had to battle back from some physical adversity she encountered in the fall, and just to get her back on the track was a highlight—seeing all that work pay off. Our hurdlers continue to progress, and Rae is going to be an exceptional jumper for us. We were really, really pleased with what we saw from the whole group. 

On the men's side, Pennix placed fourth in the 400m dash, B-State's top male finish on the day. He also earned a 7th-place finish after advancing to the finals of the 60m high hurdles. Pennix led Bluefield State's contingent in the long jump, too: in all, his three individual efforts and role on the men's 4X400m relay netted Pennix four B-State school records on the day. 

Darius Brown squeaked into the finals of the triple jump before passing two athletes on a dramatic final jump to earn a seventh-place finish and new B-State school record mark. After the opening weekend, Brown's performance sits inside the national top-25 mark.  

Eighth-place finishers included Christon Hardemon in the men's 600m run and Austin Sigman in the 800m and 1000m runs. 

In the throws, it was Dominic Escamilla whose name will adorn the record board, but in both the shot put and weight throw, four Big Blue competitors topped the existing school record (Escamilla, Zack Pennington, Sherman Franklin and Myles Rice in the weight and Escamilla, Pennington, Rice, and Ethan Spangler in the shot).  

Other notable performances included Jalen Jones and Bryant Welch in the 300m dash, Trevor Nefe in the 500m dash, Christon Hardemon in the 600m dash, and Thomas Smith in the shot put. Tyler Davis, who just missed the top-eight podium in both the 800m and 1000m runs for strong debut, and Dieuvens Lebreton had a solid performance in his high jump debut for the Big Blue. 

"We stretched out our men, put them in some new race distances to test some things out, and we like what we saw," Rexroat said. McKinley just had a tremendous day all over the fieldhouse, and our throwers have pushed each other in all the ways we hoped that excellent group would. We lack a little bit of depth in the men's sprints, and that's something we're focused on as we continue to build the squad, but everyone we brought gave us great effort and we're really proud of the results. This was a quality day."

Saturday's results and environment set the tone for the season, Rexroat said. 

"We were in a team meeting the night before the competition and Kentucky's busses rolled by the window behind me: the air went out of the room for a few seconds. We had a little bit of a collective recognition that we were in the thick of something special," Rexroat said. "In the morning, we walked in and the athletes saw the burnt orange Longhorn sweats—that means something in our sport. But when we got to the line, the jitters went away, the jersey watching stopped, and we did our thing. That showed some poise. Midway through the meet, Nikki Walker lines up and she's in a heat with two national champions, including Bowerman semifinalist Julien Alfred—the Bowerman in our sport's Heisman Trophy—and she didn't flinch. She just stepped into the blocks and went after it. That's a special thing to see as a coach. 
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