Northington leads W. Track at Yale

The women's track team completed one of their most successful meets of the season last Saturday at the Yale Invitational. The Quakers were led by junior sprinter Jamila Northington, who broke the nine-year-old school record in the 55 meters and became Penn's female athlete of the week. Her time of 7.21 seconds was enough to edge past Van Grover's mark of 7.22 set in 1986. Penn coach Betty Costanza was especially impressed with her performance because it was her first meet of the season. Despite the new record, Northington only finished fourth because of the high level of competition in her event. "We had some real good sprint schools that are very competitive. She was going against very fast people," assistant coach Tony Tenisci said. Freshman Tiffany Archer and Senior Nicole Maloy continued their success in the high jump by finishing first and second respectively with jumps of 5-feet-8-inches. Archer finished in first place because she was successful in her first attempt, while Maloy needed two tries. Archer and Maloy also held the top two spots at the Navy Invitational December 2, and Tenisci is impressed with their success. "We certainly have some really nice talent in the high jump. They are impressive and something to watch," Tenisci said. Costanza believes that Archer may be the "heir apparent" to Maloy, who holds the school record in the high jump at 5-9. Archer hopes to eventually break Maloy's record, and attributes some of her success to her continued training with Maloy. "She knows a lot about the high jump, and is really experienced," Archer said. She said because they both have about the same amount of talent, they push each other to do better. Senior Jane Kim crossed the finish line first in the mile but was disqualified for cutting another runner off near the end of the race. Junior Rebecca Riley and sophomore Jennifer Rocks finished second and third respectively. Junior co-captain Monica McCullough was victorious in the triple jump with a jump of 37-6.75, and finished second in the long jump at 18-5.25. Sophomore Angie Jiminez won her second consecutive multi event with 3,395 points. Tenisci believes the earlier practices over vacation helped to prepare the team. "They're in really good shape. They're relaxed, comfortable, and focused," he said. "They're coming together as a group really nicely." Costanza, however, considered the overall competition in this meet to be "average." She believes that the difficulty will continue to increase throughout the season.