A wooden track on top of Wanamaker's in New York City is where the Millrose Games and the sport indoor track began. That was in the 1890s.

And over 100 years later, the internationally-reknowned Millrose Games have since moved to the Madison Square Garden where the Wanamaker name is still a chief sponsor.

With a newer, smaller track, and a boisterous crowd, the Millrose Games easily lived up to its rosy reputation as the "grandaddy" meet of the indoor track season.

Shot putter Phil Caraher finished second in the invitational shot put as he nailed a 61'5½" as his clinching throw.

"Those were three of his best throws ever. He was very conistent," Coach Harry Groves said.

"Right now I'm exactly where I want to be," Caraher said. "My goal is to be around 63-64 feet come NCAAs."

The winner in the event was PSU graduate C.J. Hunter, who threw a 63'8¾" as he is progressing towards the World Championships, also in March.

But it was Aidan O'Reilly who turned in his best indoor performance of his career, placing third with a 4:04.32 in a star-studded 10-man field in the IC4A mile.

"O'Reilly had a good race. Winning the mile in the Garden involves a lot of tactics," Groves said. "With the smaller track, the runner has to run 11 laps and make quicker turns for the mile. And if you can't get out of the clear you will get in trouble."

And that is exactly what happened to Doug Walter, whose race didn't turn out as fortunately as O'Reilly's.

"He got in trouble early and that was it for him," Groves said. Princeton's Bill Berk won the race with a 3:58, a new Millrose record.

So far this season, Penn State's relay teams have proven that they can compete with the very best. And in the Millrose, they etched that in stone..

The 4x400 relay team of Brian Kelly, Jerry Robinson, Kevin Cripanuk and Jon Strange won their section with a time of 3:23.23.

The 4x800 team of Joe Stegbauer, Bob Hamer, Andy Scott and Mike Crescenzi finished a close second to LaSalle, with a 7.48.94 race.

"The times may be slower, but it is an exciting race because the crowd gets yelling. People like conflict," Groves said.

Next week Penn State travels to Toronto, Canada to participate in a four-way scoring meet with the University of Toronto, McGill University and Queens College.

Notes: Freshman David Crowe finished eighth in the W-IAAF Cross Country Junior Championships in Talahassee, Fla. with a time of 26.30 in the 8,000-meter race. He needed to finish in the top six, to advance to the World Championships in Antwerp, Belgium. . . . PSU graduate, Steve Brown entered the senior competiton but finished 24th in the 12,000-meter run in 36.41.