The Georgetown men’s and women’s track teams claimed several top 10 finishes as they began the outdoor season March 17 at the Maryland Invitational in College Park, Md., despite featuring only a limited selection of team members.

Director of Track and Field Julie Culley felt the local meet served as good preparation for the season to come.

“The University of Maryland meet is a very early season meet and it’s a great opportunity for our shorter distance and field event athletes to have a local opener to kick-off the outdoor season,” Culley wrote in an email to The Hoya. “Many of our athletes trained through this weekend to prepare for our full-team opening weekend on March 29-31.”

For the Hoya women last weekend, graduate student Taylor Williams came in fifth overall in the 200 meter dash with a time of 25.71.

In the 400m dash, senior Jody-Ann Knight came in second place with a time of 57.93. Freshman Shannon Meisberger followed half a second behind to claim third place with a time of 58.46.  Freshman Bryann Sandy came in 27th with a time of 1:05.97.

Freshman Malika Houston earned second place in the 100m hurdles with a time of 15.04 and 13th in the long jump with a distance of 5.16m.

For the Hoya men, freshman Josiah Laney came in 17th in the

200m dash with a time of 24.12; graduate student Sean Waterton came in 23rd with a time of 24.54.

Waterton also placed fourth in long jump with a distance of 6.21m.

In the men’s 400m dash sophomore Quincey Wilson finished seventh in 50.37, freshman Nate Alleyne finished 12th in 51.35, freshman Denzell Brown finished 21st in 53.66 and sophomore Dylan Fine finished 25th in 54.90.

The 800m race featured freshman Lawrence Leake in 14th place with a time of 2:06.78 and freshman Kino Cheltenham in 18th place with a time of 2:10.26.

In the 1500m race, Fine came in 12th in 4:07.36, junior Henry Smithers came in 16th in 4:09.11 and sophomore Dylan Scarsone came in 17th in 4:12.81.

Graduate student Brian Bjerk secured second place in shot put with a throw of 47.41m.

In terms of broader goals for the new season, Culley revealed the lofty expectations she had for her teams this spring.

“The goal for outdoor track is to qualify as many athletes to the NCAA Regional and NCAA National Championships in addition to placing as high as we can as a team at the Big East Championships,” Culley said.

When Georgetown’s men’s and women’s track teams return to competition March 30 to 31, they will divide between the Stanford Relays, Florida Relays and Raleigh Relays.

“Stanford, Florida and Raleigh serves as a big weekend for our team to hit as many NCAA Regional standards as possible,” Culley said. “We split the team three ways to maximize our opportunity and to try and put our athletes in the best position to qualify early on for the regional championships. We are looking forward to seeing how many athletes are able to do just that.”