Big Red outdistances M. Track

The Penn men's track team destroyed Cornell 114-49 in a dual meet last year. This year the Big Red exacted revenge. Cornell won 10 of the 19 events on Saturday as the Big Red (3-1, 1-0 Ivy League) beat visiting Penn (0-2, 0-2) 93-61 at Kane Sports Complex. "We have a better team than we did last year," Cornell coach Lou Duesing said. "It's a team that's very young with a lot of freshmen. It takes time for them to get adjusted and acclimated to college competition." While the Quakers had an edge in the field events, the Big Red won the meet by dominating on the track. Cornell took first in eight of the 11 track events but an early mishap on the track almost spelled doom for the Big Red. Cornell's 4x100-meter relay team was disqualified after dropping its baton outside of the passing zone. Penn also suffered from a dropped baton but the Quakers avoided the disheartening DQ. "I thought at that point we had given the meet away," Duesing said. "Sometimes as the 4x100 goes, so does the meet." But Cornell came back in the next event -- the 1500 meters -- as three of the top four finishers were Big Red runners. Cornell's Colin Moore outlasted teammate Geoff Van Fleet and Quakers junior Mark Granshaw to win the race in 3:55.5. Cornell took first in every race longer than 400 meters on Saturday. The 800-meter showdown between Cornell's Greg Cipolaro and Penn's Andrew Girardin was no different as the Big Red again came out on top. In the race, Girardin stayed on Cipolaro's shoulder for the first lap and then took the lead going into the first turn of the second and final lap. But Cipolaro stayed right behind the Penn sophomore, pulling even with him coming out of the last turn. The race turned into a 100-meter sprint and the faster Cipolaro won by 64/100ths of a second. "I didn't run a very smart race," Girardin said. "Cipolaro can outkick me in the last 100 meters in just about anything. My goal was to run the third 200 faster and I just didn't." John Novak was the Big Red winner in the 5000 meters with a time of 14:59.92. The Cornell distance runner -- who missed the entire indoor season after slipping on snow outside of his apartment -- tied his personal record in only his third race this year. Penn did take first place in the 400-meter hurdles -- the closest event of the day. The Quakers' Craig Douglas defeated Cornell hurdler David Winn by just 1/100th of a second, 53.55 to 53.56. "They were pretty much neck and neck the whole race," Penn coach Charlie Powell said. "Craig was ahead after three hurdles and they were together after hurdle number five. Craig pulled ahead just after the last turn and held [Winn] off." The Quakers kept the meet close with their performances in the field events. Penn had the top finisher in each of the four events -- Matt Daghasotti in the hammer throw, Brent Stiles in the shot put, Matt Pagliasotti in the discus and Seth Beaver in the javelin. But while the Quakers swept the top three spots in the javelin throw, they did not have the depth in the other throwing events; Cornell took second and third place in the other three throws. Penn's Stan Anderson was the only multiple winner on the day as he took first in both the high jump (6'9.75'') and the triple jump (49'5.25').

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