Junior Mathew Johnson leads Men's Indoor Track & Field to fifth place finish at All-Ohio Championships

By Tim Glon

WESTERVILLE — Junior Mathew Johnson was third in the 1-mile and fourth in the 3k to lead the Ohio Northern men's indoor track and field team at the All-Ohio Championships on Saturday afternoon at Otterbein's Rike Center.

The Polar Bears (24-7 overall) scored 48.5 points, less than a point from a top-3 finish.

Mount Union won the team title with 111.5 points, Ohio Wesleyan was second with 73 points and Otterbein and Baldwin Wallace tied for third with 49 points each.

Johnson finished third in the 1-mile run in 4:25.36 and was fourth in the 3,000-meter run in 8:54.92.

Sophomore Jeff Denny finished close behind in the 3k, finishing sixth in 8:56.70.

Junior Josh Colbert was fourth in the long jump with a leap of 6.83 meters and was sixth in the 60-meter dash in 7.08 seconds.

Northern posted a 2-3 finish in the 5,000-meter run as senior Michael Simmons was second in 15:20.12 and junior Mark Berton was third in 15:30.22.

Sophomore Ryan Brancheau finished fifth in the high jump by clearing 1.92 meters.

Ohio Northern's 4x200-meter relay team of junior Francisque Pierre-Jerome, sophomore Jonathan Roesler and freshman Devon Jones and Christian Rupe were fourth in 1:32.09.

The Polar Bears will return to action next Saturday at the Meindel Last Call at Capital.