WILLIMANTIC, Conn. – Colin McCabe added yet another accomplishment to his rapidly growing collection as, for the fourth week in-a-row, the Massachusetts Maritime Academy two-sport athlete set a track and field record. Competing in the Eastern Connecticut State University Invitational, the freshman thrower beat a crowd of upperclassmen for first place and the new meet record.

McCabe has continually revised the Academy track and field record book for shot put. In his first three collegiate events, he bested his effort from the previous week, setting a new mark each time despite invariably awful weather. Given a sunny Friday, McCabe put his shot a whopping 14.41m, beating Bridgewater State's Austin James, a senior, at 14.22m.

The Dartmouth, Mass. native's shot was finally good enough for first place, as in the previous two meets, McCabe was bested by his hometown university's Jared Louf-Woods, a senior and one of New England's top throwers. This time, the throw was more than enough, shattering one of the longest standing ECSU Invite records of 13.87m, set in 2009 by an ECSU alumnus. McCabe's put distance also placed No. 3 in Academy history, behind his second and third meets of the year.

McCabe was not the only athlete to excel over the weekend, with Michelle Sheehan continuing her torrid pace. Last week, the sophomore runner set the Maritime mark in the 400m at 1:05.21. At ECSU, Sheehan ran the 400m in 1:07.11, the third-best time in Academy history.

A day later, Sheehan competed in the prestigious Sean Collier Invitational at MIT and just missed breaking the university record in the 400m. She crossed the finish at 1:05.66, just .45 seconds behind the all-time mark. Sheehan also came close to besting her own 400m Hurdles finish, with a 1:18.66 mark just back of her 1:16.44 record from 2017.

Six other women competed at Eastern Conn, while 20 men took part in events. Heather Seggelin earned the Bucs eight points with her second-place finish in the 5000m, while Meaghan Hamilton added another eight with a 1:16.90 in the 400m Hurdles, followed closely by Sheehan in fourth (1:21.07).

Zachary Ferreira was second among D-III athletes and third overall in the 3000m Steeplechase at 11:55.70, earning eight points for MMA. Luke Bridges was fourth among D-III athletes in the 100m Dash at 11.79 seconds, earning four points. Christopher Mackay added a point with a sixth-place finish (out of 17) in the 1500m at 4:29.16, less than five seconds out of third.

Meanwhile, the 4x100m Relay team of Ryan Hayes, Luke Bridges, Ethan Cummings, and Michael Monahan claimed the bronze with a 46.86 finish for six points. Mitchell Conroy was fourth among D-III throwers at 38.75m in the discus throw.

Despite the efforts of McCabe, Sheehan, and others, Maritime took fourth out of four in both men and women. Sheehan was one of only 10 athletes accepted to the MIT meet, with David Moore also achieving a superlative result. Moore's javelin throw of 41.04m placed eighth out of 25 in a very competitive field.

McCabe's record-putting shot in the previous weekend's meet was just shy of the Top 50 shots in all of NCAA Division III, of which only five are by freshman. That half-century list denotes the athletes qualified for the D-III Outdoor Championship, only nine of which, including Louf-Woods, are from New England.

While Maritime's star thrower may currently be on the outside looking in, McCabe's consolation prize is MASCAC Men's Field Athlete of the Week and Track and Men's Track and Field Rookie of the Week for April 10-16. Sheehan joined him with a distinction as she was listed on the MASCAC Honor Roll for Women's Track and Field.

The full results are available for ECSU [link] and MIT [link]. Next weekend is the MASCAC Championship at Bridgewater State, with the event due to start at 11 a.m. Make sure to bookmark www.mmabucs.com and get the inside scoop on Facebook and Twitter @mmabuccaneers. Plus, check out our new Instagram @massmaritimebuccaneers.

Gabriel Fidler, Sports Information Associate