By Christopher Hunt
Johnathan Shawel of Notre Dame looked gassed, like someone ad threw quick-dry cement in his path and Villanova’s Carl MacKenzie fought like mad to get around. Then just when it seemed Shawel might walk to the finish he accelerated again and MacKenzie hit the wall.
Shawel won the men’s 1,000 at the Big East Championships in 2:24.69. Teammate Blake Choplin sprinted up for second in 2:25.19 while teammates in the standing and around the track erupted. The race was the first in an avalanche of scoring that gave Notre Dame the conference title with 146.50 points. Georgetown scored 104 for second and Louisville finished third with 93.
“I thought I was dead,” Shawel said. “I don’t know where that came from.”
Shawel was paying for taking the pace when the field started to track him down on the bell lap and MacKenzie breathing down is neck . Shawel seemed almost desparate to hold on. Then he somehow found a second wind just when MacKenzie tanked and when Clark scrambled for second the momentum swing was evident.
“I was doubting myself,” Shawel said. “I don’t know what hit me. It doesn’t matter as you make it to the finish line first.”
Then Jack Howard covered UConn’s Cody Harper’s dynamic move with 250 left in the 800 meters. Howard paced him down the backstretch but was simply gearing up for another surge then pushed around on the last turn. Howard won in 1:51.24 with Harper second in 1:52.14. The Irish got another two points from senior Jim Notwell’s sixth place finish in that event.
Howard said Shawel’s win inspired him.
“That got me fired up,” Howard said. “Shawel had that big kick. I was pretty calm before my race but I was jumping up and down after that. I think it definitely helped me a lot in my race seeing that.”
Two events later, Jordan Carlson (4:10.12) and Daniel Clark (4:10.71) took second and third in the mile and Notre Dame had effectively run away with the meet.
“We knew it we could come up big in the first couple events that we could depress some people,” Notre Dame coach Joe Piane said.
Shawel, Clark, Kevin Labus and Blake Choplin also finished second in the 4x800 rela in 7:31.72. Senior Eric Quick claimed the triple jump in 50 feet, 8.75 inches.
“We had a ton of bodies,” Piane said. “But we had a ton of bodies that we ready to run.”
Notre Dame’s Denes Veres finished second in the weight throw in 55-10.25. Louisville’s Matt Bruce, who won the 5,000 Friday, took over the 3,000 meters Sunday with three laps left and won in 8:08.71. But the Cardinals did most of it’s damage in the field. Weston Banks won the shot put in 57-11.25. Rudon Bastian (25-10), Wesley Smith (24-05.75) and Tone Belt (24-5.50) went 1-3-4 in the long jump, respectively.
Georgetown was led by Chris Kinney’s win in the 60 hurdles in 7.83 and Kenny Mitchell, who won the 200 in 21.34.
Reach Christopher Hunt at chunt@armorytrack.com.