WV Wesleyan's Cuylor Edgell established a new WVIAC meet record in the decathlon.
(GLENVILLE, W.Va.)---West Virginia Wesleyan's Cuylor Edgell claimed the WVIAC men's decathlon title in record fashion, while Seton Hill's Erin Beattie defended her title to cap off the multi-event portion of the league meet.
Edgell's NCAA provisional decathlon mark of 6313 points bettered former Concord star Dustin Greenwood's mark of 6298 for the conference record.
Beattie's tally of 4271 points also established a new meet heptathlon record, erasing the old mark of 4188 established by Concord's Karachi Mbagwu.
No marks by three competitors keyed a wild finish to the decathlon. Defending event champion Ricky Kump (WVWC) no heighted in the pole vault to allow Edgell to move ahead in the standings with two events remaining.
In the javelin, two more competitors found themselves with no marks allowing Kump to move back in the chase for the title. However, Edgell won the event-concluding 1500 meter final to clinch the win. Kump finished second with 5777 pts and Seton Hill’s Josh Fouse was third with 5439 pts.
The 1-2 finish by Wesleyan athletes allow the Bobcats to hold first place with 19 points heading into the main portion of the WVIAC men's meet, Seton Hill trails with eight points, and Wheeling Jesuit has four.
Beattie held off Glenville State rookie Marteney Jacobs and West Virginia Wesleyan's Jasmine Claggett for her second straight heptathlon title. Jacobs grabbed second with 4116 pts while Claggett earned third with 3909 pts.
The women saw two individual event records fall as WVWC's Ashli Knotts bettered the 800m record by 4 seconds running a 2:21.16 and Concord’s Brittany Pratt jumped a 5.22m in the long jump bettering the previous mark of 4.97m.
Seton Hill holds a slim lead of 11-10 over West Virginia Wesleyan going into next weekend's championship event, while Glenville stands in third with 8 pts and Concord has 2 pts.
The main portion of the WVIAC Championship Meet gets underway 9:00 am on Friday, April 30th and concludes the following day. All events are contested at Wheeling Jesuit University.