Anderson Finishes Ninth in HCAC Indoor Championships

The Anderson University men's track and field team finished ninth place with a score of 25 points during the Heartland Collegiate Athletic Conference (HCAC) Indoor Championships on Sunday in Terre Haute.

"Outside of the recovering health from Clayton Wilson and Kaleb Gucinski which limited some scoring, the men showed up to compete hard on Sunday," Coach Sol Stephens said. "Practice leading up to this meet have been great. It's the first real action in a year and over a year for the younger ones but the prep showed."

Caleb Carrao (Indianapolis, Ind./Heritage Christian School) charged to second in the 400-meter dash with a personal record (PR) time of 51.67 seconds, earning all-conference honors. The freshman from Indianapolis trailed the conference leader by just 0.04 seconds.

"Carrao led the results for us but to us, it was no surprise," Stephens said. "He works hard every day trying to improve his craft to points where I have had to tell him to pace himself."

The Ravens fielded a 4x200 relay of Clay Meadows (New Castle, Ind./Shenandoah), Jair Adams (Indianapolis, Ind./Heritage Christian School), Hunter Taylor (Waterloo, Ind./DeKalb) and Carrao, which captured second with a time of 1 minute, 34.20 seconds to earn all-HCAC recognition. Anderson also put together a 4x400 relay of Josh Soden (Anderson, Ind./Shenandoah), Taylor, Adams and Carrao, which locked up third with a season-best time of 3:38.72 to garner all-conference honors.

"If I am honest I have to say that I could not have run as strong as I did without my team's encouragement and ultimately God's blessing," Carrao said. "I think everyone on the team showed a strong sense of courage that allowed us to give all that we have and because of this we can all go home proud!"

"Carrao, Soden and Taylor are the definition of the word coachable," Stephens said. "Meadows and Adams are doing a great job with showing the way as far as the effort and expectations on the track, the weight room and more importantly, the classroom in working with the sprinters. Both relays being on the podium gives them momentum towards the separation into their individual events moving forward. Their unity and work ethic for one another will pull us forward. We'll clean some things up going into outdoor to improve our standings."

The Ravens fielded a 4,000 distance medley relay of Soden, Xavier Morales (Valparaiso, Ind./Valparaiso), Taylor and Kaleb Gucinski (Fishers, Ind./Fishers), which raced to seventh with a season-best time of 11:57.00.

Meadows raced to eighth (23.94) in the 200 and posted a PR time of 7.44 seconds in the 60-meter dash.

Adams turned in a season-best distance in the long jump with a leap of 5.73 meters (18 feet, 9.75 inches). The junior also sprinted to a time of 7.37 seconds in the 60-meter dash.

"It was far from my best day but far from my worst day," Adams said. "As for our team, it isn't the size of the dog but the size of the fight on the dog. We were small but still had great performances all around"

Morales put together a PR time of 26.08 seconds in the 200.

Clayton Wilson (Greencastle, Ind./Greencastle) closed out the 3,000 with a season-best time of 9:58.12. The senior from Greencastle put together a 5,000 time of 17:23.69.

Gucinski ran to a time of 10:05.74 in the 3,000.

Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology secured its 11th consecutive indoor HCAC title with a score of 194 points. Manchester University came in second with 104.5 points, finishing ahead of Defiance College (66), Hanover College (58) and Transylvania University (56). Bluffton University and Franklin College tied for sixth with 53 points, finishing ahead of Earlham College (31.5), Anderson (25) and Mount St. Joseph University (0), which rounds out the HCAC standings.

The Ravens resume their season in outdoor as they compete in the Yellow Jacket Collegiate Open on March 27 at 10:30 a.m. in Cedarville, Ohio.