AUSTIN, Texas—With the best mark of his collegiate career and the seventh-longest outdoor distance in school history fifth year Villanova athlete Malik Cunningham (St. Andrew, Jamaica) became a first team All-American in the triple jump at Mike A. Myers Stadium on Friday night. Cunningham soared 16.17 meters at the 2023 NCAA Outdoor Track & Field Championships to finish seventh in his signature event and tally the best national finish by a Wildcats men's athlete in any of the jumps in 44 years. Junior distance runner Liam Murphy (Millstone, N.J.) finished 11^th in the final of the 1500 meters earlier on Friday night and Villanova scored two team points at the NCAA Championships with Cunningham's top-eight finish.
 
The last time the Wildcats had a men's athlete score in one of the jumps at the NCAA Championships was in 1979 when Nate Cooper was the national champion in the triple jump. Cooper was already the only athlete in school history ahead of Cunningham on the Wildcats all-time performance list in the triple jump. They are now linked as two of only six Villanova men's competitors to ever be an All-American in one of the jumps. Both athletes are two time All-Americans, with Cooper tallying back-to-back top-four outdoor finishes in 1978 (4^th) and 1979 (1^st). Cunningham was a second team All-American indoors in 2022 (14^th place) and made his outdoor NCAA Championships debut with Friday night's sterling performance.
 
A pair of successful jumps which came on back-to-back attempts during the triple jump trials were all Cunningham needed to leap into history. He was second in the order of athletes in the first of two flights in the triple jump and fouled on his first attempt of the night. Cunningham's second jump was measured at 15.78 meters, good enough for sixth place at the time of the jump and for the moment good enough to have Cunningham inside the top-nine who would advance from the initial set of three jumps to take three more attempts in the final. There would eventually be 10 athletes who surpassed 16 meters during the trials.
 
Cunningham's career moment came on his third attempt when he powered down the runway and got off a clean jump which was measured at 16.17 meters. It beat Cunningham's existing lifetime best by five centimeters and his longest previous outdoor jump by seven centimeters. His new top mark is now the seventh-longest outdoor triple jump in school history and ranks ninth overall in the Wildcats record book. Cunningham's jump is the longest by a Villanova athlete since Cooper's school-record performance of 17.10 meters on June 2, 1979 which won him a national title.
 
Two flights of the triple jump began concurrently just after 8 p.m. but the first flight was quickly well ahead of the second in the pace of jumps taken. When Cunningham's mark of 16.17 meters popped up on the digital results board alongside the competition it moved him up to fourth place in the live standings. That was likely to be a strong enough mark for a spot in the final, although Cunningham had to wait out several remaining jumps in both flights before knowing for sure that his spot was secured. He wound up in seventh place going into the final and there was little change in the standings as the nine athletes who advanced combined for just 10 more clean jumps out of a possible 27 attempts in the final.
 
Cunningham closed out his final collegiate season this Spring with his fourth career BIG EAST title and second outdoors. He also finished second in the triple jump at the Penn Relays and was seventh at the NCAA East Preliminary two weeks ago to secure his spot at the national championships. His two team points scored on Friday night account for the Wildcats scoring at the outdoor NCAA Championships for the 59^th time in the last 76 seasons. Villanova is one of only 27 schools to score at the outdoor national meet at least 59 times. The two team points for the Wildcats put them in a tie for 61^st place in the final team standings. Villanova was one of two BIG EAST schools (Butler) and one of five Mid-Atlantic Region programs (Navy, Princeton, Penn State, Fairleigh Dickinson) to tally a team finish at the meet.
 
This year marked the ninth time in the last 12 seasons that the Wildcats had at least one athlete qualify for the national championship race in the 1500 meters. Murphy finished 11^th in Friday night's race with a time of 3:45.72 to cap off a remarkable year of competition. He made his outdoor NCAA Championships debut this week and will be a second team All-American in the 1500 meters when those honors are officially announced next week. Murphy's finish marks the 36^th time that Villanova has had an All-American in the 1500 meters.
 
The first half of Friday night's championship race was a physical one with a lot of jockeying for position in the middle of a crowded pack of 12 runners. Murphy was boxed into a tight spot with several runners around him approaching 700 meters and appeared as if he was going to move towards the outside with two laps to go. Such a move didn't quite happen at that point in time, but one lap later as the field approached the bell Murphy was near the back of the pack and no longer had any choice but to swing wide in order to give himself a chance to get into contention in the final 400 meters.
 
Just as he had in the semifinal round two nights earlier, Murphy had to go as far out as the middle of lane three to surge to the front of the pack; he actually took a few strides in Friday's race where his right foot landed on the line for lane four. It was a viable strategy and when the bell rang the official splits showed virtually no separation between Joe Waskom of Washington, Adam Spencer of Wisconsin and Murphy as the trio were within two-hundredths of a second of each other with 400 meters to go. The splits showed seven runners to still be within less than a quarter second of the lead at the bell.
 
Murphy's list of accolades for the 2022-23 competition seasons make for one of the most successful and memorable seasons by a Villanova athlete in several years. During cross country season in the Fall he was the individual champion at the NCAA Mid-Atlantic Regional and the Mid-Atlantic Region Athlete of the Year. During the indoor season he ran a PR of 3:55.58 in the Mile, set an indoor school record and won a BIG EAST title in the 3000 meters and anchored the Wildcats to both a school record and a BIG EAST gold medal in the distance medley relay.
 
What was left for an outdoor encore? First came his PR of 3:39.42 in the 1500 meters at Princeton, followed two weeks later by anchoring Villanova to a Championship of America title in the 4xMile relay at the Penn Relays. Then came BIG EAST titles in both the 5000 meters and the 4x800 meter relay, both of which set new meet and Villanova Stadium records with respective marks of 13:43.32 and 7:17.96. Murphy was an automatic qualifier in the 1500 meters through each of the first two rounds of the event at the NCAA East Preliminary last month. For good measure he was the fastest qualifier coming out of the East region for this week's national championships. Murphy ran his second-fastest career 1500 meter race (3:39.82) two nights ago in the national semifinals before capping off his remarkable year with Friday night's second team All-America finish.
 
One night of competition remains at the NCAA Championships, with women's junior high jumper Roschell Clayton (Montego Bay, Jamaica) in action on Saturday night at 8:30 p.m. Eastern time (7:30 p.m. Central time).