Mallett repeats as decathlon champ, Straus claims heptathlon title again for C-SC at Heart track championships

FAYETTE, Mo. — Drew Mallett repeated as the winner in the men’s decathlon and Delaney Straus repeated as the winner of the women’s heptathlon at the Heart of America Athletic Conference Outdoor Track and Field Championships on Friday and Saturday at Central Methodist University.

The Culver-Stockton College men’s track and field team recorded 40 team points to finish in a tie for ninth place. Central Methodist won the team portion with 196 team points. The women’s team scored 57 total points to place seventh. Central Methodist and Benedictine tied for the team title with 179 points each.

Mallett scored a school record 6,391 points in the decathlon, holding off Central Methodist’s Cary Hunter, who totaled 6,371 points to place second. He also placed eighth in the javelin with a throw of 154 feet.

Senior Jabez Rivers earned all-Heart third team honors by taking third in the 110 hurdles in a time of 14.77 seconds and third in the 400 hurdles in a time of 55.35 seconds. Mallett, Rivers, Ayden Hodges and Judah Rivers finished fifth in the 4×100-meter relay with a time of 42.75 seconds.

Kenny Tucker placed third in the 5,000 race walk with a time of 28:25.25, and set a personal high mark in the decathlon with a total of 4,216 points to place sixth. Gannon McNamee was sixth in the 5,000 race walk with a time of 32:11.72. 

Straus garnered 4,510 points in the heptathlon, winning the event by 223 points. In the 400 hurdles, she placed fourth with a time of 1:04.79, and she was fifth in the triple jump with a mark of 35 feet, 10 3/4 inches.

Senior Faith Younce won the 5,000-meter race walk with a time of 29:42.96. Klaudia Blaszczyk finished third in the race walk with a time of 36:47.66, while Emma Berry placed fifth with a time of 45:21.84.

Younce and Berry finished sixth and eighth in the 3,000-meter steeplechase, with Younce finishing in a time of 12:48.44, and Berry posting a time of 13:31.17.

Freshman Abagail Mooney placed fifth in the high jump with a mark of 4 feet, 11 1/2 inches, and sixth in the pole vault with a mark of 9 feet, 0 1/4 inches.

Kinlie Judd placed fifth in the pole vault at 9 feet, 6 1/4 inches, while Zoi Smith placed eighth with a mark of 8 feet, 6 1/4 inches.

The Wildcats placed eighth in the 4×400 with a time of 4:14.97 and eighth in the 4×800 with a time of 10;12.89.