JaiQuan Earls and Brittany Gill brought home wins, and Bethune-Cookman brought home results that place the Wildcats among the Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference top five this weekend at the Carolina Challenge hosted by the University Of South Carolina.

Earls, a sophomore, took the triple jump, posting a leap of 49 feet, ¼ inch that's the third best in the MEAC this season. Joel Sampson had a 48'2 that places him fifth in the league.  

"Earls was brilliant for us," said BCU Head Coach Donald Cooper. "We need him to be great." 
 
Gill won the 5000 meter run win 18:55.99, while Deja Davis' fourth-place time of 17:50.4 in the Invite race moved her to the top of the MEAC.

So it went for BCU the weekend, starting with pentathlon and heptathlon competition on Thursday.

Tyson Wright, Brett Heholt and Marc McCoy finished the meet fifth, sixth and tenth, but registered the first, second and fifth best efforts in the MEAC. On the women's side, Monae Nichols was runner-up to Tennessee's Kiara Rhodes in the pentathlon, but is the clear leader in the MEAC, with Quamecha Morrision and Thea Shaw also in the top five.

Other notable performances this weekend:
Christine McNeal's long jump of 17'11 and 39'0 ¼" in the triple jump (Both sixth in the MEAC)
Nichols' 38'11" triple jump (seventh)
Jordan Williams' 21.24 in the 200 (sixth)
Carlin Berryhill's 4:13.73 in the mile (second)
Xavier Walton's 8:46.31 in the 3000 (sixth)
Daniel Kiptoo's's 15:29.59 in the 5000 (sixth)
Earls also had a 23'9 ½ long jump (third).

"It was a good meet for us," Cooper said. "We were able to accomplish some goals that we set for the meet.  We got most of our multi-athletes qualified, which was needed."

BCU will return to action next weekend.