In Eastern men’s track head coach Tom Akers’ words, it was a flat-footed win.

But Akers said he’ll use Saturday’s 88-59 win over University of Missouri-Kansas City in Lantz as something to build on.

“We had some good and some bad,” Akers said. “It just didn’t seem like they were that excited about it because it was a dual track meet. Most meets we have are against four or five teams.”

Some of the good Akers referred to came in the form of senior Jarrod Macklin’s pair of wins in the 60-meter dash (7.02 seconds) and the 200 (21.91). Sophomore Jermaine Jones also won two events – the 60-meter hurdles (8.4) and 400-meter dash (50.85).

Jones said he has been battling some nagging injuries.

“We’ve all been been putting in some hard work in practice,” Jones said. “I think we’ve all got some little minor injuries that we’ve been fighting. But I think we’re all starting to improve and we’ll peak at the right time.”

Outside of Jones’ showing in the hurdles, Akers said the team was a few steps slower in those events.

“I was a little dissapointed in that,” Akers said. “We were physically flat and weren’t mentally prepared to compete.”

The meets in the weeks to come should inflate the form of the Panthers. The team travels to Indiana, Southern Illinois for large invites in consecutive weeks. The meets are the teams’ last tune-ups before the Ohio Valley Conference meet Feb. 22-23.

Akers said the lack of enthusiasm could be attributed to a sluggish start after the semester break.

“They’re just a little heavy footed after break,” Akers said. “Although we were pretty strong Thursday in practice. It’s more mental than physical – we’ve got to carry over what we do in practice to what we do in a meet.”

Senior Andy Derks won the 3,000 meter run for the Panthers with a time of 8:39.85, which Akers said would put him at fifth-best in the OVC.

Both the 1600 meter relay teams and distance medley teams won their respective events. Josh Stroot won the pole vault as he cleared a distance of 15-feet, 1-inch.

Akers said he was confident in his team’s ability to peak at the right time – the conference meet. He said that despite the teams weaknesses that showed on Saturday, the Panthers will be in contention to win the meet.

“We’re deep,” Akers said. “We’ve been showing that in every event. We’re a little thin in the long, triple and high jumps, but we’ve got to keep on continuing to get solid performances every week.”