Everything went according to plan for Eastern in Lantz Fieldhouse this weekend at the Ohio Valley Conference Indoor Track & Field Championships as the team ran away with its third consecutive title at Lantz Arena.

With 197 team points, the Panthers left everyone else far behind them, leading the rest of the pack by at least 75 points. Eastern Kentucky finished a distance second with 122 points, followed by Southeast Missouri, 114, and Tennessee State, 113. Murray State and Morehead State limped in with 48 points and 16 points respectively, while Tennessee Tech and Tennessee-Martin failed to record any team points.

The Panthers’ dominance was capitalized by the second to last event of the meet – the 3,000 meter run. Four of Eastern’s seniors, Kyle O’Brien (8:31.15), Josh Vance (8:41.78), Andy Derks (8:45.96) and Jeff Jonaitis (8:47.65) runners finished first, second, third and fourth in the event respectively.

“We had some pretty big plans coming in and everything just went as planned,” O’Brien said.

The win was sweetened by the fact all four of Eastern season took the top four spots on the podium.

“That was wonderful,” O’Brien said. “We took a look at the heat coming in, and we knew it was possible.”

O’Brien also won the 5,000 meter run, finishing less than three tenths of a second ahead of Jonaitis, who was followed by junior Jackson Johnson.

O’Brien was named Co-Athlete of the Meet along with Nick Horton of Tennessee State, Steve Maina (Eastern Kentucky) and Shelton Scott (Southeast Missouri).

Horton won the 200 meter (22.04) and the 400 meter (48.5) dashes and ran a leg on the winning 4 x 400 relay team. Two-time defending OVC champion Eastern senior Jarrod Macklin was not able to defend his title in the 400 against Horton because he is red-shirting this season.

Maina won the 800 (1:53.63) meter run and mile (4:16. 28). Scott won the long jump (23’2 1/2″) and triple jump (49’7″).

Derks and Vance helped Eastern win the distance medley relay along with juniors Jermain Jones and Kevin Atkins.

The quartet finished over 12 second ahead of Eastern Kentucky’s teams with a time of 10:20.05.

Jones claimed first place in the 60 meter dash with a time of 8.19.

Eastern head coach Tom Akers was named Coach of the Meet.

Akers was happy with his team’s results.

“You’re always happy when you win,” Akers said. “If you’re not happy when you win, something’s wrong.”

Akers gave a lot of credit to the distance crew, which dominated the meet.

“The distance crew did a fantastic job,” Akers said. “They dominated the conference, no one even tried to battle them in the 3K and 5K.

O’Brien, Vance, Derks and Jonaitis’ imminent departure at the end of the year did place a slight damper on the victory.

“I hope the freshmen were paying attention,” cross country coach John McInerney said. “It’s always tough (to lose four guys to graduation). They’ve done such great stuff for us. They went out the way we wanted them to.”