ITHACA, N.Y. - School records in the 3,000-meter run, 60-meter hurdles, 300-meter run and long jump were set today as the Daemen College women's indoor track and field team returned to competition at the Marc Deneault Invitational hosted by Cornell University at Barton Hall.  The unscored meet marked Daemen's first competition since the SPIRE Indoor Track and Field Challenge on February 5-6 after their trip to last weekend's Colgate Class of '32 Invitational was cancelled due to inclement weather.

The headliner today was once again long distance runner Mackenzie Donahue (East Aurora, N.Y./East Aurora).  The Wildcats' track star eclipsed her own school record in the 3,000-meter run, running today's race in 10:15.43 to shave some 30 seconds off the previous mark (10:45.78) which was set almost a year ago to the day (February 21, 2015) at the East Coast Conference Indoor Track and Field Championships.  Donahue's time was good for seventh place out of 26 competitors today.  She was joined in the top-10 by teammate Amy Trabert (Amherst, N.Y./Amherst) who finished in ninth place with what would have been a new record time (10:39.67) had Donahue not come in ahead of her.

Today's record-setting performance is just another in the growing list of accomplishments for Donahue who has established herself as one of Daemen's all-time greats in any sport.  Last fall, she became the first Daemen athlete to qualify and compete in a national championship event at the NCAA Division II level, doing so in the sport of cross country.  Two weeks ago she set a team record in the 5,000-meter run (17:15.05), eclipsing the event's provisional qualifying time for the NCAA Division II National Championships.  In so doing, she put herself in position for an invitation to the national championship meet  which will take place in Pittsburg, Kansas from March 11-12.  Runners with the top 16 recorded times across the country will ultimately qualify; Donahue's time was ranked 12th in the nation at the time.

Also in the record-setting mood today was freshman Sam Carro (Canandaigua, N.Y./Canandaigua), freshman Kyra Kress (Wayland, N.Y./Alfred-Almond Central) and junior Ashley Krol (Depew, N.Y./Depew).  

Carro demolished the Wildcats' previous best time (10.50 seconds) in the 60-meter hurdles, running today's preliminary race in 9.72 seconds which qualified her for the event finals where she finished eighth.  The previous record was set by Morgan Stefanik on December 15, 2012 (SPIRE Collegiate Season Opener) in the program's second-ever indoor meet.

Kress, who has already broken the team's pole vault record twice this season, established a new benchmark for the 300-meter dash, finishing in 16th place with a time of 45.16 seconds.

And, the veteran Krol leaped 4.77 meters in the long jump to set a new school record as well.  That performance was good for an 11th place finish today out of 22 entrants.  It's the second team record for Krol who also holds the program's top triple jump mark (9.93 meters) set at last season's Colgate Class of '32 Invitational.

The meet today marked Daemen's second this season at Cornell's Barton Hall.  The Wildcats previously competed here in the Robert J. Kane Invitational on January 30.

It was also Daemen's final tune-up opportunity in preparation for the East Coast Conference Indoor Track and Field Championships which are slated for February 26 at the Ocean Breeze Athletic Complex in Staten Island, N.Y.