Inside HOKIE SPORTS | Vol. 10 No. 4 | March 2018

26 Inside Hokie Sports The Virginia Tech track and field teams combined to win eight gold medals, and 20 of them earned a spot on the All-ACC first team, and yet the Hokies trudged back to the team bus following the ACC Indoor Track and Field Championships with somber looks on their faces. This bunch didn’t necessarily want medals. They wanted the big trophies, ones symbolic of team championships, and unfortunately, they came up just short. “If you’re in a position where you’re disappointed with second, then I think your program is in a really good spot,” Tech director of track and field and cross country Dave Cianelli said. Both Tech squads finished second at the league’s indoor meet, which was held Feb. 22-24 at the Clemson Indoor Track and Field Complex on the Tigers’ campus. Despite scoring 107 points—an impressive number—the Tech men came up four points short of Florida State in the race for the league crown. The Tech women scored 81 points and also came up short against the Seminoles, who won with 91. Cianelli and his coaches found it hard to fault their athletes, who displayed their grit, toughness and talent over the course of three days. Their painful takeaway was this—the Seminoles were just a touch better on both sides. “I think it’s human nature to go back and say, ‘We could have done this there, or this in this event,’ but I try not to do that,” Cianelli said. “I’ve been on the other side—winning meets by very, very slim margins—and I’ve been on this side, where you lose a championship and get second. “But I’m really, really proud of the kids, with the way they fought to the end. You’ve got to give Florida State credit. They had a good meet, and they’re very talented. They did what they needed to do. Hats off to them.” The Hokies got strong performances from their pole vaulters and their middle-distance and distance runners on both sides. Most notably, the men’s pole vaulters swept the top three spots early on the final day to bring the men’s team back into the hunt. The men’s vaulters continued their dominance in the event—a Hokie has won the individual indoor title in this event 11 times since the school joined the ACC. Deakin Volz won his first career ACC championship, leading the trio of Hokies atop the leaderboard. Volz and teammate Torben Laidig finished with top vaults of 5.50 meters (18 feet, 0.5 inch), but Volz won on progressions. Laidig claimed the silver medal, while freshman Joel Leon Benitez captured his first ACC medal with a top vault of 5.10 meters (16 feet, 8.75 inches). Jaelyn Demory finished sixth with a personal-best vault of 5.00 meters (16 feet, 4.75 inches). “The guy vaulters did a tremendous job,” pole vault coach Bob Phillips said. “Deakin and Torben jumped season bests to take the top two spots. Joel is still not 100 percent [with an ankle injury], but was able to take a couple of jumps and make the podium, which was a fantastic effort. And Jaelyn may have been the performer of the meet for us, scoring in his heptathlon debut the first two days of competition and then jumping a triple PR [personal record] in the vault.” Like their vaulting counterparts, the men’s middle-distance and distance runners dominated, starting with the distance medley relay team winning a gold medal on the first day. The quartet of Daniel Jaskowak, Brandon Thomas, Thierry Siewe Yanga and Neil Gourley ran the event in a time of 9 minutes, 38.31 seconds, which was a facility record. On the final day, Tech won titles in both the 800-meter run and the mile, with Gourley setting a facility record in the 800 with a time of 1:47.04 and Ciattei winning his second straight indoor title in the mile with a time of 4:03.08. Patrick Joseph finished fourth in the 800, while Diego Zarate claimed a silver medal in the mile and Jaskowak finished seventh in the mile. Though mostly a middle-distance runner, Ciattei came back two hours later and actually scored in the 3,000—and he scored while running out of the slower of the two sections of runners in the event. He came in sixth overall. “That was an amazing effort for him to come back from the mile and then score out of the first section of the 3,000,” Cianelli said. “You just don’t see that. That was an incredible effort. Vince and Neil and Jaskowak and Patty … those guys have been doing that for the last three or four years, and that’s been the backbone of our middle-distance program.” At the longer distances, Peter Seufer took care of business, winning two bronze medals by coming in third in both the 3,000 and the 5,000. The two medals marked the firsts of his career. Jack Joyce also got into the act, coming in seventh in the 3,000 to give the Hokies three of the top seven performances. The same thing occurredon thewomen’s side, as the DMR team of Rachel Pocratsky, Arlicia Bush, ShannonQuinn and SarahEdwards rolled to victory in a school-record time of 10:57.60. The Tech women won the DMR at the ACCmeet TECH TRACK TEAMS FINISH SECOND AT ACC Indoor Track and Field CHAMPIONSHIPS The Hokies won eight events and 28 student- athletes earned All-ACC recognition—and felt disappointed at just missing out on bringing home the team championships by Jimmy Robertson Rachel Pocratsky