Track | Difficult stretch of postseason meets looms for Syracuse's top athletes

By: McGhee Cost

Posted: 5/8/08

Aulton Kohn isn't a flashy guy. The Syracuse senior is known by his teammates as an experienced veteran and winner of five Big East sprint championships but not as a showboat after victory.

That changed Sunday when Kohn won the 100-meter dash, the only sprint title he had never captured in his years at Syracuse, at the Big East Outdoor Track and Field Championships in Villanova, Pa.

"The emotions got the best of me this time around," Kohn said. "I'm normally not that character who chants and jumps around, but I celebrated a lot after the 100."

Kohn's emotional finish was the exclamation point on a big weekend for the Orange track and field team. Though the team failed to surpass its overall standing of ninth overall from the indoor season, seven athletes recorded all-Big East performances, and three athletes, Kyle Heath, Jillian Drouin and Kohn, captured individual championships.

Kohn, Sosa and several other members of the team who have qualified for ECAC, IC4A, and NCAA meets are gearing for another month of competition.

"We never really achieve our goals with just one meet like the Big East championship because our goals are really high," Fox said. "There's always another meet, always a bigger meet."

Ramon Sosa's time of 13.85 seconds in the 110-meter hurdles earned him all-Big East honors but wasn't enough to defend his title in the event. Since making light contact with a hurdle earlier in the year, Sosa's season has been a struggle to recover in time for championship season. He qualified for NCAA regional competition last weekend and hopes to regain his status as a championship level sprinter in his final events.

"Everybody knew that this was the meet, this was the time to perform," Sosa said. "They came out and did well. I'm proud of them."

Fox doesn't want his best athletes to grow complacent in the wake of strong Big East finishes. While celebration is in order for such individual victories, the team's training regimen will quickly fall back into place and remain every bit as rigorous as ever, if not more, in the weeks of the championship season.

The Orange will begin its stringent new schedule with the IC4A and ECAC championships in two weeks. Events at these meets are difficult to qualify for, and recording a victory in an event there is no small feat. Veterans on the team expect to finish highly, while younger athletes will be competing mostly for experience.

For the team's upperclassmen, the real challenge comes at the NCAA regional championships May 30-31 in Tallahassee, Fla. It is at this meet athletes can qualify for the NCAA national championships. Kohn, Sosa, Drouin and Heath have all set goals to win at the national meet and attempt to become All-Americans, the highest collegiate honor in the country.

While some have achieved this distinction already - both Drouin and the currently injured Michael LeBlanc did it last year - it is still the motivating force behind all of the events the Orange competes in.

"Every year, the winning gets better and better," Kohn said. "New people come in, and it feels good to know that you're still on top."

These athletes also have an even loftier goal on their plates after their time at SU is over, after the conclusion of this year's meets. Many hope to qualify for the national teams of their respective countries and compete in the Olympic Games this summer.

"I'm running really well right now, and I'm hoping it carries over into the rest of the championship season," Heath said. "But the big goal is the Olympic trials and trying to be successful there."

Though many athletes are proceeding into bigger and more difficult meets, the majority of the team is finished for the season. They will train during the summer, but some will not compete again until the winter. They will also have to cope with the loss of such dominant competitors as Drouin and Heath.

Fox isn't worried, though. His prospects for next season are bright.

"We've made a lot of progress this year," Fox said. "Next year looks like it will be a good year for us."

mpcost@syr.edu