James Blocker captured the high jump with a leap of 6-10.25 at the Penn State Open.
In his first competition of the year, sophomore jumper James Blocker topped all competitors at the Penn State Open, clearing 2.09 meters (6-10.25) to win the high jump competition.
Blocker had several good attempts at 7-1 which is the NCAA provisional height, but just couldn’t clear the height.
“James is a super competitor, and just gutted out this win today,” said Morgan State head coach Neville Hodge. “I was really happy with the performance, but technically we have a few things that need to improve so that James can be more consistent. We are very excited about Blocker’s start, as we really have not been working on the jump focusing more on his speed and strength.”
Henry Jackson continues to roll in his sprint races as he qualified for the championships in both the 60 and the 200 meter dashes, taking second and fifth respectively. Other qualifiers for the MEAC and or the IC4A championships included Andrew Simpson, who had the fastest qualifying time in the 60 hurdles as he PR’ed in 8.05 seconds to take fourth.
The men’s 4x400 relay team of Cashmere O’Neal, Donald Sanford, Keith Anderson and Reggie Carter, Sam Henry in the men’s mile, Dakari Taylor-Watson in the triple jump, and Carter in the 500 were all qualifiers, respectively, in their events.
“We have a great core of men who we think are going to really be excited to watch this year,” said assistant coach Ralph Jones. “This was definitely a positive start to the season, now we must keep the momentum going and keep the athletes healthy.”
The Bears return to action next week, January 24-25 at the Penn State National. Results of this weeks meet can be found at http://gopsusports.cstv.com/sports/c-track/stats/2007-2008/openresults.html
The Morgan State track and field office contributed to this release.
