Three School Records Fall, Cloud County Women Take 4th at NJCAA Indoor Championships
Totaling 14 top-eight finishes across two days of competition, the Cloud County Community College women's track and field team narrowly missed out on bringing home some team hardware while finishing in fourth place overall at the 2024 NJCAA Indoor Track and Field Championships inside the Alachua County Sports and Events Center in Gainesville, Florida on Saturday, March 2nd.
After scoring 23 total points on the first day of action and entering the final day of competition in third place, Cloud County added another 37.5 points on the final day to finish with 60.5 points and just 3.5 points out of tying for third place with New Mexico Junior College (64 points). The 2024 NJCAA Indoor Track team title was split by Barton and Iowa Western after seeing both teams finish with 106 total points as the Reivers overcame a 10-point deficit in the final event of the meet by winning the 4x400 meter relay to force the Co-National Championship. Other teams to finish in the top 10 out of the 34 scoring teams included Western Texas College (fifth, 42 points), Central Arizona (sixth, 41 points), South Plains College (seventh, 37 points), Trinidad State (eighth, 33 points), Monroe College (ninth, 26 points) and Colby Community College (10th, 25 points).
Friday Recap:
Wasting little time to get on the team scoreboard, Cloud County netted seven points in the pole vault after seeing Bradie Medina clear a season-best mark of 3.41 meters (11 ft. - 2.25 in.) to take fourth while seeing teammates Elizabeth Dunham (seventh) and Jasmine Sakaguchi (ninth) both clear 3.31 meters (10 ft. – 10.25 in.). While the pole vault was ongoing, CCCC had the distance medley relay team of Mercy Angaamchaab, Rafiatu Nuhu, Nontokozo Ncube, and N Vanee Anchike run a time of 11:47.46 to set a school record and win the event by nearly nine full seconds over second-place Iowa Western while finishing as one of two teams to finish under the 12-minute mark. Anchike came back a short time later to run in the 5,000 meters and take fifth overall with a time of 17:46.82 while seeing Ozia Trujillo finish in eighth by eclipsing the 18-minute mark for the first time this season to run a time of 17:58.17.
Cloud County's remaining point on Friday came in the shot put with Adrienne Locke-Garcia making the podium after recording a throw of 13.21 meters (43 ft. – 4.25 in.) later on in the evening alongside qualifying times run in the 600 meters by Ncube (1:35.35) and Angaamchaab (1:35.45) as well as the 800 meters (Angaamchaab – 2:21.37) and Anchike (1,000 meters – 2:56.18).
Saturday Results:
Scoring seventh place finishes in a pair of events to kick off day two action, sophomore Shackala Henry recorded a high jump mark of 1.62 meters (5 ft. – 3.75 in.) before going on to record a mark of 11.82 meters (38 ft. – 9.5 in.) in the triple jump in her only two events of the meet. The first track event of the day saw another school record fall for the T-Birds as the 4x800 meter relay team (Angaamchaab, Ncube, Trujillo, and Anchike) ran a time of 9:09.97 to set a new facility record while rewriting the CCCC record book after breaking the previous record time of 9:28.56 set in 2022. Ncube went on to take sixth in the 600 meters (1:33.39) before seeing Anchike finish in fourth in the mile run (4:56.45) and a national runner-up finish in the 1,000 meters (2:55.48) while Angaamchaab took seventh in the 800 meters (2:17.53). Cloud County's other top-eight finish and scoring event on Saturday saw Nuhu take third in the 400 meters by running a time of 54.93 seconds to improve her preliminary race time by nearly a full second.
What's Next?
A much-needed week off to recover and prepare for the change from the indoor to the outdoor season is in store for Cloud County after having competed in six of the past seven weekends dating back to January 20th. The 2024 outdoor season for CCCC will get underway on Friday, March 15th with a trip to Denton, Texas to take part in the two-day University of North Texas Invitational to kick off the first of six scheduled regular-season events that the T-Birds will take part in for the outdoor season.