PLYMOUTH, N.H. – Kyle Thomas broke his own record in the 60 meter dash and Caden Latulippe broke a ten year old record in the pole vault as both the Keene State College men's and women's indoor track and field teams finished second at the Panther Invitational on Saturday at the Bank of New Hampshire Fieldhouse/ALLWell North on the campus of Plymouth State University.

Thomas' new record, breaking his previous mark of 6.92 set on December 7, came in the 60 meters preliminary race when he finished first out of 61 runners in 6.87.  He was just .01 seconds from that mark in the finals of that event, placing second after being one of three to finish in 6.88.  The 6.87 mark is currently tied for the 18th-best nationally in Division III.  The other new school record fell later in the day when Latulippe, a sophomore, posted a mark of 4.30 meters to place third in the pole vault, easing past the old record of 4.00 meters set by Quentin Bazarnicki in 2015.  KSC has now set seven new school bests this indoor season, including Thomas twice in the 60 meter dash, Aidan Law in the 200 meter dash and the 400 meter dash, Latulippe in the pole vault, the relay team of Law, Jonathan DeAguiar, Keith O'Donnell, and Thomas in the 4 x 200, and Keely Giordano in the 200 meter dash on the women's side.

It was another strong day for Law, who won the long jump by posting a mark of 6.81 meters.  He added a third place run in the 60 meter preliminary race in 7.03 before finishing in 7.13 (sixth) in the finals.

The Owls gained first, second, and third place points for the team thanks to three underclassmen in the 5,000 meters as sophomore Griffin Urnezis won the event (15:42.48), freshman Ben Tetu finished second (15:55.12), and sophomore Tyler Bolaske third (16:00.85).

Freshman Jayden Baker added an individual win in the shot put, posting a mark of 13.86 meters on his final throw to edge out seniors Logan Cosgrove of Middlebury College (13.77 meters) and Sproul Derolus (13.43 meters) of Division II Franklin Pierce University.

KSC's 4 x 200 relay foursome of Thomas, DeAguiar, Sean Von Ranson, and Law helped solidify the team's finish at the meet by placing second in 1:32.29 behind Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute's "A" relay that finished in 1:29.70.  The time was just 1.11 away from their school record set earlier this year.

Elsewhere, Von Ranson finished tenth of 31 in the 200 meters (23.47).  RPI, ranked No. 15 in the USTFCCCA national TFRI, had six of the top nine in that event including the winner in freshman Cam Caso (22.63) to add 23 points to their team total of 251.5.  Dawson Hamele was fourth in the 60 meter hurdles preliminary (9.14) and fifth in the finals of that event in 9.19.  The Owl men racked up 74 points in their second place team finish, with fellow Little East Conference member and host Plymouth State in third with 54.

On the women's side, the Owls finished with three event wins and a number of other strong finishes.  A week after setting a new 200 meter dash record, Giordano won both the preliminary race (8.01) and the finals (7.97) of the 60 meter dash this weekend.  Carlie Cronin finished first in the pole vault in 3.00 meters, and KSC's 4 x 800 meter relay team of Sarah Ames, Anna O'Reilly, Molly Lu McKellar, and Maggie St. John dominated, winning by over 26 seconds in 10:21.09.

KSC also got top three finishes from Autumn Boisvert in the 5,000 meters (3rd, 19:24.48), McKellar in the 60 meter hurdles (3rd, 9.26), and Sara Christian in the 3,000 meters (3rd, 11:03.83).  McKellar added a scoring performance by placing fifth in the shot put (11.18 meters), as did Kallie Warner in the 3,000 meters (4th/17, 11:10.15).  Freshman Allyse Brien was fourth in the high jump (1.46 meters), Drea Defreitas fourth in the triple jump (10.55 meters) and sixth in the long jump (5.01 meters), Ava Fortin sixth of 18 in the mile (5:42.93), and Bryn Dickinson eighth of 24 in the 800 meters (2:32.75) to wrap up the Owls' scoring contingent.  Keene State (83 points) edged out Plymouth State (79 points) to finish second.  RPI won the women's side with 155 points.

"Team wise, we are competing at the top of every meet and we hope to continue it," said Owls head coach Dan Roark.  "We got second on the men's and women's sides behind a good RPI team.  In all disciplines, we are competing at a high level and setting the tone for the season.  A great day all around."

Friday and Saturday, the Owls also sent select athletes to the John Thomas Terrier Classic hosted by Boston University.  Jake Velazquez ran the men's mile in 4:21.10 today, over five seconds faster than last week's performance.  Ethan Strand of the University of North Carolina won that event, which featured mostly Division I competitors, in 3:48.32.  The best-finishing Division III runner was sophomore Jack Czarnecki of RPI (4:07.10).  Velazquez was 20th among Division III finishers.  Friday, Ames finished the women's mile in 5:12.88, O'Reilly in 5:16.23, and St. John in 5:26.65.  Ames' finish was 15th among the Division III contingent, just slightly behind Rhode Island College's Haley Oliver (5:09.21).  Ames' time was nearly 12 seconds faster than her last performance in the mile at last year's Little East championship meet, and O'Reilly's nearly 18 seconds better than her time at the Plymouth State Invitational two weeks ago.

The USTFCCCA's initial track and field ratings indexes came out this past week; the Keene State men were ranked eighth in the East region including second in the Little East Conference (only behind the University of Southern Maine who was fourth).  The women checked in initially at No. 12 in the East region, third in the conference behind USM (seventh) and the University of Massachusetts-Boston (tenth).

Keene State will travel to Middlebury College next Saturday, February 8.