The sub four-minute mile is a staple of the Villanova men’s track and field program.

Freshman Marco Langon is now the 25th member of the club, as he raced to a time of 3:58.82 at the Widener Invitational at Leslie C. Quick Jr. Stadium on Friday night.

What makes the feat more impressive is that much of Langon’s training has been for cross country and that this meet came together only a couple of days prior.

“Honestly, it’s not that I didn’t expect it,” head coach Marcus O’Sullivan said. “He’s good enough to be able to do that kind of stuff. It just wasn’t on the plan for another month.”

Langon was an unattached runner as he is redshirting for the 2023 outdoor season. He was racing in the elite section of 10 runners.

Langon ran a time of 57.39 in the final lap to secure the sub-four-minute time.

This is the 19th sub-four-minute miler that O’Sullivan has coached over his 25 years leading the ‘Cats.

This number could have easily been 21 runners, as graduate student Evan Addison posted a time of 4:00.08, and redshirt freshman Devon Comber ran a 4:00.24. Both times are personal bests for each runner.

“There’s nothing,” O’Sullivan said about the narrow difference Addison and Comber had to join the sub-four-minute club. “It’s just being in the right stride at the right point from what they are doing. You’re talking only, like, a couple of feet.”

In the sprints, freshman Amari Prescod posted the fastest 100-meter dash time in four years at Lannigan Field in the Virginia Challenge with a personal best time of 10.64 seconds. Prescod shaved more than a tenth of a second off his previous personal best time.

As Prescod got onto the blocks, a gust of wind came up, which helped him post this personal best time.

“Psychologically for him, to run as fast as he did, I think that was nice for him,” O’Sullivan said. “He was pretty fired up.”

In the 400-meter race, freshman Jimmy Milgie led the Villanova runners in that event with a time of 49.20, and junior Jakob Kunzer finished close to Milgie with a time of 49.29.

At the Widener Invitational on Saturday, freshman Luke Rakowitz posted a personal best time of 48.88 seconds in the 400-meter dash for fifth overall out of 73 runners. In the 200-meter event, he created another personal best with a time of 22.68.

Back at the Virginia Challenge on Saturday, graduate student Trevor Potts beat his previous lifetime personal best in the 800 by more than eight tenths of a second with a time of 1:52.46.

Potts was not going to return this season because of a job offer, but after his job offer was extended, he came back for another year and has made the most of it.

“That’s the best race I’ve ever seen him run,” O’Sullivan said. “He passed about five guys to end up winning his section and running a big PR.”

In the throwing events, junior Nick Coffey threw to a mark of 66.34 meters in the javelin to finish runner-up. Coffey now owns three of the top-ten throws on the Wildcats performance list, and the throw he executed was the second longest in his career.

Sophomore Tristan Bolinsky posted a mark of 52.15-meter mark in the hammer to post his second longest throw of the season and the third longest of his career.

Next week, the ‘Cats will race in the prestigious Penn Relays at Franklin Field in Philadelphia this Thursday through Saturday.

Much of the distance events will run on Thursday with graduate student Ryan Cutter having to lower his time in the 10k to make regionals. Graduate students Haftu Strintzos and Josh Phillips will compete in the 5,000-meter, and the milers will be racing as well.

Friday will feature the distance medley relay and Saturday will showcase the 4 by mile.

“We got two good teams on the relay side,” O’Sullivan said. “It’s always good representing the University in a competitive nature.”