A Beautiful Light Blue Day

Jan Merrill-Morin should know.

Obviously.

After all, the Rutgers University women's distance coach has an incredible dossier: Olympic finalist, two-time Pan Am Games champion, 12-time National AAU champion, 24-time USA National Team member.

And, oh yes. USA and world indoor record-setter.

So when Coach Merrill-Morin talks about Rutgers sophomore Brianna Deming's bright future in the sport, you're assured it's coming from a knowing source.

Not long after Deming ran off with the women's individual title in the 24th Annual Metropolitan Intercollegiate Championships Friday at Van Cortlandt Park, with a five-kilometer performance of 18:05, there was Merrill-Morin saying, "Brianna was tremendous today, she was just 'in the flow,' as we say, she was at the top of her game.

"She's just a sophomore and in that time she's learned an awful lot, about how to run, how to pace herself in a race. She's becoming a real student of the sport, learning when to make a move, when not to make a move, how to take your energy and make sure you have it at the end."

Deming did all the right things and won convincingly over the Columbia duo of Noelle Van Rysselberghe (18:19) and Anne Carey (18:24), Fordham’s Anisa Arsenault (18:32) and NYU’s Kirsten Keller (18:36).

Earning heaps of plaudits, too, was Fordham junior Julian Saad, champion of the men's 84th Met Championships with an eight-kilometer clocking of 25:15. Both individual victories represented great leaps forward — Deming ran third in the 2010 Met race in 18:30, Saad was 14th a year ago in 26:30.

While the individual winners wrote bright new scripts, it was the same old light blue-hued story line in the team scoring category. Behind Deming of Rutgers were six Columbia runners in the top 15 as the Lions raced off with their 14th consecutive Met team title.

Immediately back of Fordham's Saad were four Columbia Lions — Byron Jones (25:19), Daniel Everett (25:32), Adam Behnke (25:55) and Daniel Nestor (25:59), with Kyle Cooke completing team scoring in eighth place (26:04) as their team claimed its ninth Met crown in the past 10 years and 13th in the last 16.

"This is just awesome," smiled Deming, a pharmacy major from Webster, N.Y. "To win it this year, that was my goal... definitely. A lof things are coming together. I feel so much mentally stronger. I got a huge PR (previous best 19:49).

"There were a bunch of us together at the mile, around 5:45. I took the lead with about 1,000 meters to go, then just brought it home on the flats."

Saad, too, struck gold on the concluding flats paralleling Broadway.

"I started out in about 15th-17th place, around 4:45-something, 4:50 pace, I hung in there, and finished strong off coming off the hills; that was it," said Saad, a junior psychology major from Trumbull, Conn., coiffed with a distinctive 'FloHawk' hair style (raised tufts in an aerodynamic design).

"The credit, by far, goes out to my distance coach, Jack Maloney, along with (head) coach (Tom) Dewey," said Saad. "I know Fordham's had a great track history over the years. I just want to add to it, to go after some school records if I can."

He was a 4:25 miler, 9:25 two-miler at Trumbull High (once he got serious about running and shed his once-chubby physique). His Fordham bests are 8:22 for the indoor 3,000 meters and 14:53 for the outdoor 5,000 meters.

"The championship season is just beginning," said Saad. "Next up is the Atlantic-10s (Oct. 29 in Charlotte, N.C.). I want to be ready for all of them."

Adding it all up, the Columbia women netted 37 points, with Rutgers (52), St. John's (99), Fordham (107), NYU (121) and Wagner (193) next in line. Trailing were Manhattan (225), Hofstra (245), Southern Connecticut (249), St. Francis (253), Seton Hall (304), St. Peter's (344) and Fairleigh Dickinson (391).

On the men's side, the Columbia win (with 22 points) was far more decisive, with NYU (61) second, Fordham (88) third, St. Francis (124) fourth and Manhattan (164) fifth. Behind them came Rutgers (204), Wagner (223), Hofstra (243), Seton Hall (256), LIU (285), St. Peter's (300), Marist (301) and Fairleigh Dickinson (319).

And the Columbia wins came at far less than full strength. Lions' coach Willy Wood sat out almost all his front-liners in preparation for next weekend's Pre-Nationals at Indiana State. (With the Heptagonals next up, Oct. 29 at Princeton.) The powerful Iona team took the day off, too.

Still, Coach Wood and his well-stocked Columbia squads wouldn't have missed the Mets for the world.

"The Mets is always important meet to us," he stressed. "The kids who come here understand knowing they represent our program. They know that winning is important.

"Our first kid, Byron Jones, he PR'd by over a minute," said Wood. "And our second kid, Daniel Everett, a freshman, he'd never even run a college cross country meet before. He's been training with our 800 (meter) guys and our milers. But he's a great runner, he ran 4:06 in high school. We're thrilled. His upside is just incredible.

"And Noelle Van Rysselberghe, she was an NCAA Regional qualifier last year, at 10,000 meters as well as 5,000. She was hurt all year and this was her first meet back."

"We certainly made a strong statement today. Our energy is really positive. People come to Columbia now knowing they can do things on the big stage.

"We like where we train. We're here (Van Cortlandt) a lot, we're in Central Park a lot. We're up at Rockefeller State Park a lot. Ninety-five percent of our training is on soft surfaces. It's a very positive situation."

More good news from Columbia — senior Kyle Merber (of Dix Hills, N.Y.) is back in full training after an injury incurred stepping on a bottle in the summer of 2010 and missing nearly nine months of racing and training. His 3:58.52 indoor mile, as a sophomore in March 2010, remains the Ivy League record.