Penn Relays: Wisconsin, Houston, Georgetown, South Carolina headline a busy final day

Wisconsin’s dynamic Australian distance running duo of Olli Hoare and Morgan McDonald knew they would have to go full speed Saturday after Indiana dominated the first two legs of the 4 x mile relay at the Penn Relays, and they were more than up to the task.

Dealing with strong winds that swirled around Franklin Field, Hoare brought the Badgers back from seventh place on the third leg to give his team a chance. Then McDonald, a three-time NCAA champion, gutted out the final 100 meters to get a nose in front at the tape in an exciting finish to a busy day that ended the 125th carnival.

Wisconsin, which recorded its only Penn Relays men’s Championship of America title in 1916, finished the weekend with two wins, having won Friday night’s distance medley.

Houston was the big winner, with three championships on the men’s side and a 4x100 title for women, while Georgetown added the 4x800 championship to its sprint medley win from Friday. The South Carolina women took their third event of the weekend in Saturday’s 4x400, after capturing the 4x200 and shuttle hurdle relay on Friday.

The closest race in terms of time came in the men’s 4 x mile, in which only .04 seconds separated Wisconsin (16 minutes, 39.82 seconds) from Indiana (16:39.86).

Hoare, a junior, ran a 4:03.3 split to give the Badgers a chance, and McDonald took the baton to chase down the Hoosiers’ Ben Veatch, while Georgetown’s Spencer Brown came up to make it a three-way battle. It came down to the final 200 meters, where none of the three wanted to make the first move.

“I didn’t want to be the first one to make the move, especially with the wind coming around into the final straight,” said McDonald, a fifth-year senior. “I thought that whoever made the last move was going to be able to win it, and so that’s kind of how I wanted to play out.”

McDonald gave a final chase in the final 75 meters, gradually closing the gap and barely eking out the win.

“I wasn’t sure I had it until the line,” he said.

Casey Comber’s anchor leg of 4:07.5 gave Villanova a sixth-place finish.

Indiana closed out its Penn Relays as one of the most hard-luck teams in carnival history. The Hoosiers finished second in four men’s Championship of America events, losing every race by less than a second and three of the races by .25 of a second or less. They also were runners-up in three relays in 2018.

Georgetown was responsible for two of those narrow losses, in Friday night’s sprint medley and Saturday’s 4x800. Redshirt senior Joe White anchored both Hoyas teams, with the 4x800 team recording a time of 7:25.18.

“I couldn’t have asked for much better from my teammates,” White said. “They did what they were supposed to do, and, at that point, all I could do was perform and try to win it.”

The Hoosiers did get a win in the women’s 4x800, with anchor Kelsey Harris outrunning Vanderbilt at the start of her leg and Virginia Tech at the end for the win in 8:33.47.

“I knew that I was going to have to have a pretty substantial lead if I wanted to come in first,” said Harris, whose twin sister, Haley, ran the second leg. “My teammates were able to do that for me, and I was able to put together the best race that I could and the outcome was just what we wanted.”

Houston was able to put together the men’s sprint relay triple, running 39.23 in the 4x100 and 3:02.61 in the 4x400, a time that was faster than the winning mark (3:02.70) in the USA vs. the World men’s 4x400, after capturing the 4x200 on Friday. Mario Burke ran a leg on each of the three teams, and won the college 100 meters Saturday in 10.20 seconds.

South Carolina picked up its third relay win of the weekend in the 4x400, as junior Wadeline Jonathas ran an anchor leg of 52.14 seconds to get the Gamecocks to the line in 3:32.33.