Jordin Poindexter ’22 claimed two first-place individual titles and All-Conference honors at the Southern Conference Outdoor Championships May 1 in Birmingham, Alabama.—Photo by Todd Drexler | sesportsmedia.com.
With outstanding performances across the board, the VMI men’s track and field team fought its way to a third-place finish to complete the 2022 Southern Conference Outdoor Championships hosted by Samford University in Birmingham, Alabama, May 1.
Samford won the team title with a resounding 226 points ahead of second-place Western Carolina’s 149 points. VMI came in third with 123 points, followed by Furman with 95.
Jordin Poindexter ’22, sprinter, capped a spectacular weekend with first-place individual titles and All-Conference honors in both the 100-meter and 200-meter races. In the 100 meter, the Richmond, Virginia, native set a new facility record in 10.27 seconds, the second-fastest all-time mark for the event in VMI program history.
In the 200 meter, Poindexter’s first-place mark of 20.89 seconds set a new VMI record, beating Mario Small’s [’91] time of 20.90 seconds from the 1991 outdoor season for his second All-Conference honor of the day.
To cap the day, he ran the second leg of the 4×400 relay team, joining with Jeremiah Wilks ’25, Richard Edwards ’25, and Johnnie Walker ’22, and helped the group to a title in 3:11.08—a new facility record—to edge out Wofford College’s second-place time of 3:14.54.
Solomon Ghosh ’22 highlighted the efforts of the VMI field group by placing first in the discus throw with a mark of 48.70 meters.
Wilks ran the 100 meter with a personal-record time of 10.67 seconds for sixth place in the final and again ran a PR in the 200 meter in 21.59 seconds for fourth place.
Walker earned a lifetime-best time of 47.96 seconds in the 400 meter to place second and earn All-Conference honors for the event. Edwards also earned a PR in the 400 meter in 48.62 seconds for sixth place in the final.
Gavin Jenkins ’22 helps lead the VMI men to a 14th place showing at the Colonial Relays in Williamsburg, Virginia, April 1-2. Forty-four teams competed in the event.—Photo by Brian McWalters | RoadWin Photos.
Xander Topos ’25 just missed the podium in the 400-meter hurdles by placing fourth overall in 56.08 seconds, while Trent Whittaker ’23 came just shy of All-Conference honors in the 800 meter by placing fourth in 1:51.74. Zach Lauster ’22 came in ninth place in the 800 meter in 1:53.13.
Gavin Jenkins ’22 placed sixth in the 1,500 meter in 3:49.95, just ahead of D. Alex Fiorillo ’23, who was 10th in a time of 3:56.54.
Isaiah Blount ’25 placed sixth in the decathlon with 5,693 points, and Kevin Linko ’23 finished seventh in the multievent with 5,249 combined points.
Eleyah Armstrong ’25 led the VMI women at the Southern Conference championships.
Samford won the women’s event with 224 team points, followed by ETSU’s 138 and Western Carolina’s 133. VMI came in ninth place overall with 14 points.
Armstrong placed second overall in the 100-meter dash in 11.83 seconds for All-Conference honors. She finished right behind Nicole Johnson of ETSU, who won the individual title in 11.66 seconds.
Ellie Miller ’22 finished seventh in the shot put with a distance of 11.95 meters.
Ahliyah Williams ’22 came in ninth place overall in the 400-meter final with a time of 1:00.92.
Members of the VMI men’s track and field team had outstanding showings at the Virginia Challenge hosted April 22-23 by the University of Virginia.
Jenkins, a distance runner, earned an excellent performance in the 3,000-meter steeplechase, coming in 13th place overall in 8:49.92, which will place him high on the NCAA East Regional performance list.
Whittaker, also a distance runner, performed well in the 800 meter. The Rocky Mount, Virginia, native finished third overall with a time of 1:49.62, a new outdoor personal record for the event.
Ghosh also earned a solid mark in the discus throw, as he placed 14th overall with a distance of 47.42 meters, just two meters off his career-best.
After an exceptional indoor season, Whittaker was named to the Virginia Sports Information Directors All-State Second Team for his accolades during the 2022 indoor campaign.
Whittaker won the 800 meter at the SoCon Championships by coming from behind on the final lap in a then-personal best time of 1:51.02 for All-Conference marks. A week later, he placed third in the 800 meter at the IC4A/ECAC Championships in Boston in 1:49.59, a new personal record.
Editor’s Note: These articles originally appeared at vmikeydets.com.
