UPWARD CURVE: Princeton High boys’ track senior star Bruce Robertson flashes his form through a curve earlier this spring. Last Saturday, Robertson took second in the 800 at the Central Jersey Group 3 sectional meet to help the Little Tigers place fourth in the team standings. Robertson and the team’s other top-6 finishers at the sectional competition will be in action this week at the state Group 3 meet at South Plainfield. (Photo by Frank Wojciechowski)

For the Princeton High boys’ track team, its performance last Saturday at the Central Jersey Group 3 sectional meet represented a step forward.

“Looking at it overall, it is the largest number of qualifiers and largest number of points we have had since I started coaching in 2001,” said PHS head coach John Woodside, whose team placed fourth with Northern Burlington taking first followed by Hamilton and Ocean Township.

“Two years ago, we 10 medals and 41 points. Today we had 11 medals and 46 points. We had a lot of good things happen.”

But Woodside was left with a nagging feeling that even better things could have happened in the meet which took place at Monmouth Regional.

“I think we have a good enough team that we could have done even better,” maintained Woodside.

“The winner had 67 points, that is not that much to win a big meet. The door was wide open.”

Junior throwing star Tim Brennan, though, could not have done much better, winning both the shot put (50’ 7.50) and the javelin (143’3).

“It is hard to describe where to start about him; he is a very important part of our team,” asserted Woodside.

“He is a great kid, great athlete. He works as hard as any kid I have been around. More than that, he helps his teammates get better. He knows how to approach a meet and how to compete. I think of him as the rock. He is a great asset to our team; he is indispensable. He won two events, that is hard to do.”

Senior Bruce Robertson has been an asset to the team and he came up big at the sectional, taking second in the 800 (1:59.69).

“Bruce has been good all year; he had a solid race today,” said Woodside. “It was not spectacular in terms of time but it was a hot day. He ran a good race to finish second. He got himself in a good position; I am happy for him.”

The distance guys were solid across the board for Woodside. “We had 7 qualifiers — three in 1,600 (Ian McIsaac-4th; Conor Donahue-5th; Kevin Ivanov-6th), two in 800 (Robertson-2nd; McIsaac-5th) and two in 3,200 (Luke Bozich-4th; Jacob Rist-5th),” added Woodside.

“McIsaac was the only guy who qualified in two events so we had six different guys. That is the most we have had; it was a good showing. We competed hard. I am proud of them.”

Junior star McIsaac did yeoman’s work for the Little Tigers as he helped the 4×400 relay take fifth in addition to his top-six finishes in the 800 and 1,600.

“I know Ian is a little disappointed but that is good because he wants to do better,” said Woodside.

“He had a little hamstring problem on 1600 and still ran 4:28. The 800 was a good performance for him and he led off the 4×400 relay with a 52.0.”

PHS got a superb performance in the 400 hurdles from sophomore Sabar Dasgupta as he took sixth.

“Sabar ran a tremendous race in the 400 hurdles; “ said Woodside. “He had a big breakthrough a week ago with a 57.8. He ran a 57.50 today so he made breakthrough and beat that a week later.”

Woodside will be looking for more breakthroughs this weekend as his team competes in the state Group 3 meet at South Plainfield.

“We want to try to build on it; that’s the goal,” asserted Woodside. “We are going against really top level guys. We want to improve on what we did this week. The distance runners certainly feel they can do better.”