NEW YORK—Redshirt freshman middle distance runner Sean Dolan (Pennington, N.J.) was named the BIG EAST Men's Track Athlete of the Week in an announcement by the conference office on Tuesday afternoon. The honor comes after Dolan posted a personal best time of 3:39.45 in the 1500 meters in his outdoor debut at the Raleigh Relays last week.
 
Dolan currently has the nation's leading time in the 1500 meters after his sensational performance in the first outdoor race of his collegiate career. His time of 3:39.45 is the fastest by a Villanova runner during the collegiate season since 2012 and puts him into eighth place on the program's all-time in-season performance list. Dolan was one of three Wildcats to run the metric equivalent of a sub-four minute mile in Friday's meet, as he narrowly crossed the finish line ahead of fifth-year senior Casey Comber (3:39.67) and junior Charlie O'Donovan (3:41.73) who was also making his collegiate outdoor debut.
 
The past month has been quite a whirlwind for Dolan, who was a first team All-American in the Mile with a sixth place finish at the NCAA Championships earlier this month. He recorded two consecutive races below four minutes with times of 3:57.20 and 3:57.91 at the national meet after he qualified for NCAAs with a then-personal best mark of 4:01.57 at the Camel City Invitational in February. Dolan's time of 3:57.20 in the preliminary heats at the NCAA Championships put him into ninth place on the Villanova in-season performance list.
 
Dolan was the top overall finisher out of 108 competitors in the 1500 meters at the Raleigh meet.