NEW YORK, N.Y. – Another meet, another first place finish for sophomore pole vaulter Ryan Karnopp of the Moravian College men's indoor track & field team.
The sophomore won his third straight pole vaulting competition at the Lafayette-Rider Winter Games held at the New York City Armory on Friday. He cleared the 4.65-meter (15' 3") for the top of the podium, tying his season-best. The vault is an ECAC-qualifier and is currently tied for 15th in NCAA Division III according to the Track & Field Results and Reporting System (TFRRS).
Senior jumper Kristopher Joint also leaped his way up the national standings in the long jump, the event in which he claimed All-America status last season. He placed second at the Winter Games on Friday with a mark of 7.08 meters (23' 7.25"), good for the ECAC's and good for a seventh-place tie in DIII.
This season, the NCAA will invite the top 15 on the TFRRS list for the men in each event to the Indoor National Championships on March 14-15 in Lincoln, Nebraska.
Senior sprinter Yacine Zerdoum has been painstakingly close to an ECAC qualifier this winter. He narrowly missed the time two weekends ago at the Lehigh University John Covert Classic, and it looked as if his bad luck would continue on Friday in the Big Apple.
Zerdoum's first event at the Armory was the 200-meter dash, where he finished in 13th place out of 45 competitors in 22.85 seconds. The mark was merely five-hundredths of a second away from qualifying for the ECAC Indoor Championships on March 7-8 in Roxbury Crossing, Massachusetts.
Zerdoum found redemption, however, in his next event. His sixth place finish in the 400-meter dash was in an ECAC-qualifying time of 50.34 seconds.
Freshman Cory Taggert will also be making the trip on what now looks like a larger bus for the Greyhounds to the ECAC meet in March. Taggert qualified by finishing sixth in the 800-meter run in 1:57.54.
Freshman Kahron Walker, already an ECAC qualifier this indoor season, turned in another quality mark with a 1.94-meter (6' 4.25") high jump, which placed the rookie fifth at the NYC Armory.
Senior David Cariello (ninth place – 60-meter hurdles – 8.74 seconds) and junior Parker Munson (10th place – shot put – 13.81 meters – 45' 3.75") rounded out a group of Moravian top ten finishers.
Freshman thrower Greg Cahill finished right behind Munson in 11th in the shot put, recording a personal record for the third straight meet in the event. He set a new personal best mark of 13.43 meters (44' 0.75") on Friday.
The Greyhounds are back in action on Saturday, Feb. 22 for the Kutztown University Indoor Last Chance Qualifier. Moravian also has a meet scheduled the following day, Sunday, Feb. 23 at the Princeton University Invitational.
