MYRTLE BEACH, S.C. - After the first day of the Myrtle Beach Collegiate Challenge at Doug Shaw Stadium, the Coastal Carolina men's track and field team are in third place with 30 points.
The Chanticleers finished day one with a first-place finish, five top-five finishes, and four athletes that earned finals appearances on Saturday afternoon.
In the first event of the day, junior Kwesi Jackson picked up one team point for the CCU men as he finished his first career hammer throw event in 14th-place with a toss of 41.28 meters.
The trio of David Ejumeta, Dallas Wise, and Kaden Turner finished in the top-five of the long jump
competition on Friday afternoon to earn their team 23 points.
Ejumeta picked up his first career Coastal Carolina first-place finish as he came four-hundredths shy of the meet and Doug Shaw Stadium record of 7.67 meters set by Coastal graduate Erik Eckleben in 2018. The Berin City, Nigeria native's 7.63 (1.7) meters goes down as the second-best mark in Chanticleer history behind Eckleben's mark.
Wise finished in second place with 7.38 (2.5) meters and qualified for the fifth-best mark in school history.
Turner earned a fifth-place result as the freshman jumped to 7.16 (3.2) meters.
Fellow Chant Isaac Murdock earned an 11th-place finish in the same event as he jumped to 6.44 (3.2) meters.
In the javelin, freshman Aaron Keeler earned six more team points with a fourth-place finish. The Sunbury, Pa., native's 52.68 meters is the best mark of any Coastal athlete since Robert Castellani (59.45 meters) in 2018.
Graves earned the win in preliminary heat number one while Bennett finished right behind in second place. The pair also hurdled their way into the CCU record books with two of the top-10 fastest times in school history. The sophomore Williams earned a second-place finish in heat number two and added his name to the Chanticleer record books.
To finish out the Chanticleers' afternoon, Turner and fellow freshman Garrett Garmen looked to qualify for the finals in the 100 meters but fell just short.
Turner earned an 11th-place finish with a time of 10.95 (3.3), and Garman finished 24th out of 41 runners with a time of 11.21 (2.5).
Day two of the Myrtle Beach Collegiate Challenge will begin at 10 a.m ET with the men's discus and will end with the 4x400 men's relay race at 5 p.m. ET.
