Championships Central | Men's Preview

PRINCETON, N.J. -- The Ivy League Heptagonal Outdoor Track & Field Championships return to Princeton’s Weaver Stadium for the first time since 2016, as the Ancient Eight will gather to compete for the 2019 Ivy Heps titles. Both days of the championships will be broadcast live on ESPN+ beginning at 1 p.m. on each day. 2016 Rio Olympics broadcaster Bill Spaulding and Princeton alum and former Cornell coach Robert Johnson will be on the call.

After ending Harvard’s four-year run of Ivy Heps outdoor championships, Penn looks to make it back-to-back for the first time since 1985-86. But the Quakers will have to hold off not only the Crimson, but also the host team Princeton. In fact, Cornell has claimed the title a total of four of the seven times Princeton has hosted the women’s outdoor championship, including three of the past four.

Eleven Ivies rank among the top-30 nationally in 12 events, along with Penn’s 4x400m relay team, which holds the 30th-fastest time in the country so far this season.

The Quakers rank among the top-30 nationally in six events, led by junior Nia Akins. The 2019 indoor 800m national runner-up is sixth in the country in the outdoor 800m and 16th in the 1,500m, while her fellow classmate Maddie Villalba is 22nd in the latter event.

In the field, senior Anna Peyton Malizia, senior Rachel Wilson and sophomore Ashley Anumba all look to defend their respective titles in the high jump, hammer throw and discus. Malizia is 10th nationally, Wilson ranks 20th in the country and Anumba is ninth.

Anumba actually is second among the Ivies in the discus, trailing Princeton sophomore Obiageri Amaechi, who ranks sixth nationally. The two rank first and second all-time in Ivy League history with their marks from this season; Amaechi’s throw of 189-04 is first, while Anumba’s mark of 188-02 is second. 

Brown senior Carly Paul hopes to defend her heptathlon title and become the first Bear to go back-to-back in the event and the second to win the event twice, joining Lindsay Taylor, who accomplished the feat in 1999 and 2001. Paul is 11th in the country in the heptathlon this season, as well as 40th in the long jump and 77th in the high jump. 

Paul will have to hold off Cornell freshman Beatrice Juskeviciute, who ranks 20th in the country in the heptathlon with a score of 5,504, tied for the fifth-best all-time in Ivy League history.

Harvard junior Simi Fajemisin is the two-time defending triple jump champion and could become the second Crimson to win the title three-straight years and first since Dora Gyorffy (1999-01). But Fajemisin will have to get past Columbia freshman Kali Hatcher, who ranks ninth nationally in the event with a mark of 44-0, second-best all-time in Ivy League history. 

Dartmouth junior Cha’Mia Rothwell looks to make it three-for-three in the 100m hurdles, while Yale senior Andrea Masterson looks to give her team valuable points in both the 5K and 10K, where she ranks fourth and second among the Ivies, respectively.