VILLANOVA, Pa.—The accepted entries for the NCAA East Preliminary meet were announced on Thursday afternoon and Villanova will have nine members of its men's track & field team headed to Indiana to compete in the early rounds of the national championships. This year's NCAA East Preliminary takes place from May 25-28 (Wednesday-Saturday) at the Robert C. Haugh Track and Field Complex at Indiana University. The men's competition takes place on Wednesday, May 25 and Friday, May 27.
 
The contingent of nine athletes that the Wildcats will send to the East regional meet includes six track athletes and three field athletes. Villanova has six events in all on the men's schedule ranging from the 800 meters through the javelin. Five of the nine athletes from the Wildcats have competed at regionals at least once before in their careers. Senior distance runner Haftu Strintzos (Melbourne, Australia) advanced to the national championships in the 10000 meters last season, while junior middle distance runner Sean Dolan (Pennington, N.J.) is a two-time national qualifier indoors.
 
Dolan will compete in the 800 meters at the NCAA East Preliminary after winning his second straight BIG EAST title in the event last week. He competed at regionals in the 1500 meters as a redshirt freshman last year and advanced to the national quarterfinal round before going on to compete in the 800 meters at the U.S. Olympic Team Trials later in the summer. Earlier this year Dolan set an indoor school record in the 800 meters with a time of 1:47.53 at the BIG EAST Championships; his lifetime best is 1:46.41 and was set last year in the lead up to the Olympic Trials.
 
Villanova has two qualifiers for the NCAA East Preliminary in both the 1500 meters and the 10000 meters. Senior Charlie O'Donovan (Cork, Ireland) will compete for the second straight year in the 1500 meters and be joined by freshman Sean Donoghue (Dublin, Ireland). Both athletes recorded their top times of the season at the Virginia Challenge last month, where O'Donovan ran 3:41.84 and Donoghue registered a personal best mark of 3:42.45. O'Donovan has experience at the East meet from last season when he reached the quarterfinal round of the 1500 meters. He is one of 43 sub-four minute milers all-time from Villanova and registered his lifetime best of 3:40.95 in the 1500 meters at the Joe Walker Invite last year.
 
Strintzos and graduate Ryan Cutter (El Sobrante, Calif.) will compete in the national semifinal round of the 10000 meters in Indiana next week. Strintzos was an honorable mention All-American in the 10K last year and has run the fourth-fastest time in school history this season with a PR of 28:34.41 at the Virginia Challenge. That time is less than 13 seconds off the fastest in-season time in the Wildcats record book, while Cutter posted a time of 29:00.45 at the Penn Relays on April 28. It was a huge PR for Cutter, whose time ranks 11^th in Villanova history and makes him the sixth-ranked 10K runner on the program's all-time performance list.
 
The other distance runner from the Wildcats who will compete at regionals is senior Josh Phillips (Belrose, Australia), a qualifier in the 5000 meters for the second straight year. Phillips has broken 14 minutes in the 5K twice during his career, once last season when he recorded a PR of 13:48.83 and once this year when he ran 13:49.64 at the Sam Howell Invitational on April 2 in his outdoor season debut.
 
Villanova will be represented in the field events by senior Malik Cunningham (St. Andrew, Jamaica) in the triple jump and by the sophomore duo of Nick Coffey (Cranston, R.I.) and Andrew Grinnell (New Milford, Conn.) in the javelin. Cunningham is coming off his first career trip to the NCAA Championships indoors and is ranked second in school history in the triple jump with a PR of 16.12 meters from the indoor season. He has jumped as far as 16.10 meters during the current outdoor campaign and will be competing at the NCAA East Preliminary for the second straight year.
 
Coffey and Grinnell each had the best performance of their careers at the BIG EAST Championships last week when they came in second and third, respectively, in the javelin. Coffey recorded a personal best throw of 65.35 meters at the conference championships. It is the eighth-furthest throw in the Wildcats record book with the current javelin implement which was introduced in 1999 and puts Coffey third overall on the Villanova performance list with the current implement. Grinnell threw for a PR of 64.69 meters at the BIG EAST meet and is ranked fifth on the Wildcats performance list.
 
The top 48 declared athletes in each individual and relay event qualify for the early rounds of the national championships which are contested at the NCAA East Preliminary and the NCAA West Preliminary next week. The top performers from those two regional meets advance to the NCAA Championships which will be held from June 8-11 at Hayward Field in Eugene, Ore.