Devonte King and Kutztown University Men's Relay Win PSAC Crown

2016 May 16

Devonte King of Lancaster, PA, and Kutztown University's men's 4x800m relay team made history for the second straight year at the Pennsylvania State Athletic Conference (PSAC) Outdoor Track & Field Championships. Last year, a school-record was set. Saturday, that record was broken again in a title-winning run at Mansfield University.

As a team, Kutztown finished in fifth place for the second straight year. It marks KU's sixth-straight top-five finish at the PSAC Outdoor Championships.

Shippensburg won the men's title for the eighth straight year with 208.5 points. Slippery Rock finished second at 123, East Stroudsburg was third with 109, Indiana (PA) was fourth at 82 and KU rounded out the top-five with 76. For KU, it marked an increase of 14 points from last year.

The winning 4x800m run marked Kutztown's first-ever outdoor title in the event. KU's only other 4x800m title was at the 2006 Indoor Championships.

The quartet of Naeb Mengisteab (Lancaster, Pa./Conestoga Valley), Devonte King (Lancaster, Pa./J.P. McCaskey), Andrew Thompson (Upper Darby, Pa./Upper Darby) and Jared Luckanitz (Shillington, Pa./Governor Mifflin) turned in the best relay of their careers Saturday. They won the race by more than two seconds with a final time of 7:45.28, breaking last year's school-record that Mengisteab and Thompson were a part of in a second-place run.

Breaking down the title run, Mengisteab opened the relay and made a surge on the last straightaway to hand off first in 1:56.85. King ran second and built a significant lead in a 1:55.53 split. Thompson ran third in 1:57.919 while maintaining the team's lead, and Luckanitz brought home the gold as the final leg in a team-best 1:54.977.