PUEBLO, Colo. – Chadron State College had an event winner and three runners-up during an outstanding performance at the Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference Track and Field Championships at Pueblo, Colorado, on Saturday, as senior Tavion Leatherdale took home the title in the men's discus to become CSC's first gold medalist of the meet.

The finals in most of the track events and several more field events will take place on Sunday, but the Eagles wasted no time scoring points. The men's team sits fifth in the team standings after two of three days with 31 points while the women are in a three-way tie for fifth with 13 points.

Leatherdale sailed the discus 51.58 meters, or 169 feet, 2 inches, nearly 12 feet farther than his previous best. Leatherdale, who had been a high school discus standout but had never thrown it in college until this year, won the event by three feet and one inch. 

The Wayne, Nebraska native had a previous career-high of 157 feet, 9 inches at Chadron's home meet earlier this outdoor season, but topped 169 feet on two separate throws on Saturday. Leatherdale unleashed his eventual meet-winning throw of 51.58m/169-2 on his second attempt and came within an inch of it on his fourth with a mark of 51.54m/169-1. Despite scratches on his first, third and fifth attempts and a shorter throw on his sixth, no one else could catch him. It is Leatherdale's fourth meet win in the discus this outdoor season, and his first-ever placement at an RMAC meet.
 
The Eagles' silver medalists included Chayton Bynes, who took just one of his allotted six long jump attempts but went 24-feet, 2.5 inches, his best ever outdoor. He will be the No. 1 qualifier in the triple jump on Sunday after already chalking up three career All-American honors in that event, twice indoors and once outdoors. 
  
CSC sophomore Shelby Ekwall of Yoder, Wyoming was the runner-up in the women's shot put, when she threw her outdoor best of 45 feet and a quarter inch. She also won the silver medal in the shot at the RMAC Indoor Meet in February. Kristie Jordan of Encampment, Wyoming placed fourth in the shot put with a mark of 12.81m (42 feet, 0.5 inches), some 14 inches farther than her previous best, as all 13 of the CSC's women's points thus far have come from that event (eight from Ekwall, five from Jordan).

The Eagles' final silver medalist was sophomore Courtney Williams, a native of Jamaica, who chalked up 6,745 points in the decathlon, the fourth highest in CSC annals and just 42 fewer points than the winner scored.

The grueling 10-event competition, which began Friday, was pretty much a duel between Williams and Evan Atkin of UCCS, who traded the lead back and forth. Atkin led Williams by just 10 points after Friday, but after winning the 110-meter high hurdles to open Saturday's action, Williams had an 18-point lead and padded it when he threw the discus eight-and-a-half feet farther than Atkin to earn 607 points in that event compared to Atkin's 555.

But Adkins turned the tide when the cleared 14-2.75 in the pole vault to gain 714 points while Williams went just 11-11.25 for 519 points.  Williams rallied during the javelin throw, the next to last event, but he trailed Atkin by 50 points heading into the final event, the 1500 meters. The UCCS junior finished third to seal the win.

Williams was not the only placewinner in the decathlon for Chadron State. Another sophomore decathlete, Ethan Norris of Burns, Wyoming, finished sixth in the event with a career-best 6,132 points. Norris outscored Williams in both the pole vault (clearing 13-7) and the 1500 (5:06.13).

The Chadron State men picked up an additional two points with a seventh-place finish in the shot put by Casey Miller. The sophomore from Hemingford, Nebraska threw the shot 15.38 meters (50 feet, 5.5 inches).

The heptathlon also concluded on Saturday. Chadron State's two competitors finished 12th (Kailey Klein, 3,562 points) and 18th (Brenna Fackrell, 3,175 points) among a field of 20 competitors.

Chadron State had two runners qualify for the finals in both the 200 and 400. In the shorter distance, Ryan Clapper (21.44 seconds) and Ayden Hartzell (21.67 seconds) placed fourth and ninth, respectively, in the 200-meter prelims. Hartzell snagged the last spot in the finals by six one-thousandths of a second over Colorado Mesa's Amaris Mora. 

In the 400, Hartzell placed sixth in 47.88 seconds while sophomore Christopher Cormier will also be in the outside lane, placing ninth in the prelims by running 48.60 seconds. 

In the 100, Joshua St. Jean came agonizingly close to making the final but finished 10th at 10.68 seconds, just four one-hundredths off a spot in the final. St. Jean will likely figure into CSC's plans for tomorrow's 4x100-meter relay.