CHICAGO, Ill.—Senior distance runner Marco Langon (Raritan, N.J.) cruised to a gold medal in the 3000 meters and Villanova added silver medals in the 800 meters, the mile and the 4x800 meter relay at the 2026 BIG EAST Indoor Track and Field Championships presented by JEEP on Saturday afternoon. Six podium performances in all by the Wildcats over the last two days added up to 82 points and a fourth place team finish at Dr. Conrad Worrill Track and Field Center at Gately Park. Villanova scored in 10 different events during the conference championships.
 
Langon won his sixth career BIG EAST gold medal and first in the 3000 meters with a time of 7:57.65. He kicked past runners from Butler and Georgetown to take the lead with 500 meters to go and then closed with the same flourish that saw him anchor the champion distance medley relay on Friday night. Langon split 25.50 on his final lap and wound up with a winning margin of nearly three full seconds over Providence and the rest of the field of 17 runners.
 
His final 200 meters were a sight to behold, just as the case was on Friday night when it was estimated that he may have closed in as fast as 24 seconds on the final lap of the DMR. Redshirt freshman Jack Fenlon (Laois, Ireland) surged to a fourth place finish in the 3K with a time of 8:06.64. He was in eighth place with as little as 400 meters to go before passing four runners on his penultimate lap and eventually holding of the fifth place finisher from Butler by a mere half a second.
 
The day started with junior Bailey Habler (Sydney, Australia) earning his second straight silver medal in the mile in a duplicate performance from his finish at this meet last year. It was a rare sight at the start of the race after two false starts caused the field of 12 finalists to have to react to the gun no less than three times. A physical race with plenty of jostling for position came down to the bell lap and Habler crossed the finish line in 4:15.83. Sophomore Ben Thomas (Sydney, Australia) was seventh in 4:18.38.
 
Habler and Thomas later teamed up with junior Ryan Beegle (Chatham, N.J.) and graduate student Seán Donoghue (Dublin, Ireland) for a second place finish in the 4x800 meter relay. It is the 32^nd time that the Wildcats have finished on the podium indoors in the 4x800 relay. Thomas led off the race with a split of 1:53.03 and was followed by Beegle in 1:52.96, Habler in 1:52.11 and Donoghue with an anchor leg of 1:50.25. Villanova posted a time of 7:28.33 in the relay.
 
Junior middle distance runner Dan Watcke (Hinsdale, Ill.) won his fourth career BIG EAST medal in the 800 meters. In a race decided by just six-hundredths of a second at the line, Watcke earned silver with a mark of 1:46.82 which adds to his takeover of indoor 800 meter times in the Wildcats record book. He now holds the five fastest times and seven of the top 10 marks in school history indoors in his signature event.
 
Villanova added points to its team total on Saturday in the 400 meters, the 4x400 meter relay and the shot put. Junior sprinter Ethan Walls (Ridgefield, Conn.) raced in an individual BIG EAST final for the first time in his career and finished sixth in 48.43. He would later add a split of 47.77 on the third leg of the 4x400 meter relay in which the Wildcats came in fourth with a season-best time of 3:13.22.
 
Freshman Andy Geiser (Aldie, Va.) led off the relay in 49.06 and was followed by sophomore Liam Gluck (Beavercreek, Ohio) with a split of 49.00 on the second leg. Walls ran third in the relay and senior Jimmy Milgie (Wildwood, Mo.) anchored in 47.40 for one of the fastest 400 meter relay splits of his career.
 
Villanova got seven points in shot put from freshman thrower Yianni Papanikolas (Toms River, N.J.) and graduate student Tristan Bolinsky (Gordon, Pa.). Papanikolas finished fourth in his BIG EAST Championships debut with a mark of 15.63 meters and Bolinsky came in seventh with a distance of 15.07 meters.
 
The final team scores had Connecticut in first place with 194 points, followed by DePaul with 113 points and Butler (91) ahead of the Wildcats at 82 points. The rest of the team standings included Marquette (77), Georgetown (70), Providence (44), Creighton (10) and Xavier (nine).