The Penn State men's indoor track team did what it planned to do at the Penn State National Open, a non-scored meet, this past weekend at the Multi-Sport Facility.

The Nittany Lions' game plan was to pull some members of the team from individual events, in order to save them for the relays. It worked.

"What we tried to do was be as competitive as we could in the relays," Penn State men's track and field coach Harry Groves said.

The Lions blew away the rest of the competition in the 4-by-400-meter relays, the last race of the day, with a winning time of 3:10.76.

Penn State football player Ernie Terrell was the last leg of the team, which included Brian Derby, Chris Lolagne and Jaret Campisi.

It was a race the Lions led from start to finish.

Four NCAA provisional qualifying marks were set and two facility records were also broken at the two-day event.

"I think it was more of excitement," Campisi said.

"We just wanted to blow it up in front of our home crowd."

The Lions also won the 4-by-800-meter relay, with their team of Michael Jordan, Ian Hahn, Matt Lincoln and Tim Walker, who ran a time of 7:33.87.

Penn State also took second place in the distance medley relay, finishing with a time of 9:54.24.

With 50 teams and over 1,200 athletes competing at the meet, the Lions knew that first-placed finishes would be hard to come by.

"In a meet this big, if you win five or six events, you can consider yourself successful," Groves said.

The Lions still managed to snag some individual victories.

Senior J.T. Kuretich winning the Pentathlon with a score of 4,0777 points, a new facility record., and senior Chavous Nichols made it three wins in three meets in the triple jump with a leap of 52-4 1/2.

"I thought everyone did a pretty goof job," Campisi said.

Former Penn State athletes Ryan Olkowski and Guy Rose were at the meet competing for Nittany Spiked Shoe.

Olkowski came second in the 200-meter dash with a time of 21.05, while Rose also took second place in the 60-meter dash in a time of 7.91. Both were NCAA provisional qualifying marks.

On the field side, freshman Scott Vernon finished sixth in the 35-pound weight throw with a throw of 57-6 Ã|. In the same event, Aaron Ross (56-6) was seventh.