Villanova’s men’s and women’s track and field teams returned to the Main Line with hardware.

The Big East indoor track and field championships took place Friday, Feb. 23 and Saturday, Feb. 24 in Chicago, Illinois.

The men took seven podium spots and placed third overall in team rankings. Four were gold medalists.

Senior Liam Murphy and fifth-year Sean Dolan had first-place finishes in the 3000 and 800 meters, respectively. In their events, they broke the championship meet records and school records.

Sophomore Amiri Prescod won his first career Big East title in the 60 meters.

The men won the distance medley relay for the second straight year and the 22nd time overall. The relay team ran a 9:37.24. The team was composed of sophomore Marco Langon, sophomore Ronan O’Neill, fifth-year Xian Shively and Murphy.

The women had 11 podium finishes. Out of the 11 podium finishes, four of them were event champions.

Head coach Gina Procaccio guided the women to a top-two team finish for the ninth time in the last 14 years. The women finished second.

Fifth-year sprinter Jane Livingston ended in a three-way tie as the women’s high point scorer and became the first Wildcat to win the award since 2019.

Livingston was a double champion with gold medals in both the 60 meter (7.47) and the 60 meter hurdles (8.18).

Livingston is only the second female athlete in Big East history to pull off such a feat.

Senior Roschell Clayton won her first Big East indoor title in the high jump.

Junior Sadie Sigfstead claimed a gold medal in the 5000 meters.

Graduate Alex Payne placed third in the weight throw.

Head coach Marcus O’Sullivan has been a part of 16 of the team’s 22 all-time conference titles in the distance medley relay.

Prescod won gold in the 60 meter dash in 6.75 seconds. Prescod’s time of 6.75 is a personal record. Out of the 12 fastest 60 meter times in school history, Prescod has seven of them.

Dolan was chasing his third straight 800 meter indoor title. Dolan won the 800 meter by eight-hundredths of a second. The winning time of 1:46.90 broke the Big East meet record and the indoor school record.

Dolan is the first three-time champion in the indoor 800 meters in Big East history and has never lost an 800 meter race in the Big East. Dolan’s 800 meter time qualifies him for nationals.

Murphy and Langon each beat the 3000 meter Big East meet record by more than eight seconds, securing qualifying times for nationals.

Murphy crossed the finish line in 7:42.51 and Langon was right behind him in 7:43.83 as the pair each moved into the top 16 of this year’s NCAA descending order list.

“The 3000 meter was a big race,” O’Sullivan said. “I have never seen something like that in my 26 years of coaching.”

Murphy, named the Co-Outstanding Performer of the Meet, now holds the 3000 meter absolute school and Big East meet record.

Murphy additionally qualified nationally for the 5000 meters and the mile.

“I have never seen someone [qualify nationally for three events] in my time coaching,” O’Sullivan said. “Murphy has a huge range to be able to choose between the three. Murphy is rewriting the record books at Villanova.”

Junior Tristan Bolinsky in the shot put and senior Nicholas Mollica in the 400 meters earned gold medals. Bolinsky threw 15.01 meters to finish second.

Mollica came in third in the 400 meters, with a personal best of 48.18. 

As for the women, Sigfstead won her second career individual Big East title and the first one indoors with a time of 15:59.18 in the 5000 meters.

“I am really happy to come away with the win [in the 5000-meter race],” Sigfstead said to Villanova Athletics. “A good summer set me up well for this year and coming off cross country. It gave me a lot of confidence heading into the season.”

Sigfstead returned for the 3000 meters and took third place and a personal best of 9:17.10.

Payne placed third in the weight throw. The throw of 19.00 meters is now the fourth-best in school history and a personal best.

It marks the second-ever Villanovan to get a Big East podium finish in the event. 

“Going into today, it was about trusting myself,” Payne said to Villanova Athletics. “It was all about turning my brain off, trusting my technique and practice, and just executing.”

Junior Emma McGill, first-years Olivia Allen and Caelen O’Leary and junior Margaret Carroll placed third in the distance medley relay in 11:33.09.

Clayton needed one jump to secure a gold medal in the high jump. Clayton was the only one to make it over 1.75 meters. She then hit jumps at 1.80 meters and 1.85 meters, a facility record. Clayton missed attempts at 1.90 meters. It would have set a new school and Big East meet record.

Sophomore Micah Trusty, fifth-year Madison Martinez and junior Alex Stasichin ran the 800 meters. The trio finished two, three and four respectively.

Trusty ran a personal best of 2:05.61 to earn a silver medal. Martinez also found the podium in third with 2:06.98. Stasichin set a personal best of 2:07.57.

Fifth-year Adria Retter earned All-Big East honors and a third-place finish with a 13.97-meter personal best throw.

Sophomore Myonica Jackson, Trusty, Allen and Martinez finished third at 3:44.22 in the 4×400 meter relay.

After a successful weekend, some athletes set their focus on nationals.

The indoor track and field NCAA championships will take place Friday, March 8 and Saturday, March 9 in Boston, MA.