Men take fourth at Big Tens

SARAH COLLINS/Daily Despite four of first-place finishes, the Michigan men's track team was only able to muster a fourth-place team finish at the Big Ten Championships this past weekend.

There's a saying: You're only as good as the sum of your parts. Never was this more true than for the Michigan men's track team. At this past weekend's Big Ten Championships in Columbus, despite four individual titles, the sum of Michigan's parts wasn't strong enough to pull out a title for the squad.

Michigan finished in fourth place with a total of 97 points. Minnesota took the outdoor championship with an impressive 134.50 points. The finish marks the third time that Michigan has finished fourth in the 90's.

While Michigan wasn't able to pull out an overall team victory, the team did garner four individual titles over the three-day competition.

Senior co-captains Kevin Sullivan and Brian Theisen took individual titles with victories in the 1,500 meter run and the 110-meter hurdles, respectively. Sullivan's victory, with a time of 3:47.69, earned him the 12th Big Ten crown of his career - more than any other middle-distance runner in Michigan history. Theisen won the hurdles with a personal record and an NCAA-provisional-qualifying time of 13.87.

John Mortimer, who brought the Wolverines to first with his victory in the 10,000, tried to keep his team there on Saturday with another win, this time in the 3,000 steeplechase. But the Wolverines slipped to fourth overall, where they would finish.

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