Penn State men's track and field coach Harry Groves returned to a familiar place this weekend. Not only did his team travel to the college where he previously coached track and field for 13 years, it competed in the meet that he founded 39 years ago.

It proved to be a sweet homecoming as the Nittany Lions ran, threw, and jumped their way to a team victory at the Colonial Relays, held Friday and Saturday at Zable Stadium on the campus of the College of William and Mary.

The Lions earned 193 points, enough to beat out nineteen other collegiate squads. Their nearest competitor was William and Mary, which finished with 106 points.

"It was a conclusive win on our part based on our depth," Groves said.

Depth was crucial for the seven relays, and the Lions had enough talent to garner wins in the 4x1500m, the 4x110m shuttle hurdle and the distance medley relays, while placing second in the 4x100m, the 4x200m and the 4x400m relays.

The 4x1500m relay proved to be one of the more exciting races of the meet, as it remained close until the last leg when the Lions distanced themselves from the field and ran to victory over William and Mary.

The team's depth was also evident in individual events, with Penn State turning in several dominant individual performances.

"What made it so lopsided was that we had a scorer and we'd throw in another one on top of that. Even if [another team] won the event, we outscored them," Groves said.

On the track side, senior Brian Derby turned in the highest finish with a first in the 400m hurdles, despite running a 52.69, well above his seed time of 49.66. Sophomore Jaret Campisi ran a 53.58 in the same event to finish fourth.

"That was not one of my more impressive performances," Derby said. "I've got to just catch a good race to help my confidence."

In the 800m run, two Lions finished in the top five, with freshman Matt Lincoln running a 1:51.86 to finish second and senior Matt Enwright finishing fifth with a 1:52.79.

Freshman Alex Langan sprinted to a 11.15 in the 100m dash to nab fourth place, while senior John Hahn came up with a 14:48.63 to finish fifth in the 5000m run. The field events were especially strong for the men, with numerous high-placing performances. Junior Brian Stumpf had a dominating javelin throw of 68.10m, enough to give him first place by more than three meters. Dave Bollinger also clinched a win, with a 4.90m pole vault. Senior Dan Diaz had a strong showing, earning a win in the shot put with a throw of 17.29m, a third place in the discus throw (52.12m), and a fourth in the hammer throw (52.32m).

In addition to dominating the competition with high-powered performances, many of the Lions also reached qualifying marks for individual events at the NCAA regional meet, a goal for the season. The Lions will continue to work towards this goal next weekend when facing Penn, Princeton, and Villanova in the USTCA meet held at the Nittany Lion track.

While always looking ahead to the next competition, the Lions are pleased with this weekend's results.

"We did what we set out to do - let them know we are good enough to be at the Penn Relays," Groves said.

And there is nowhere better to do that than a familiar place.