{"id":208389,"date":"2018-06-26T13:41:36","date_gmt":"2018-06-26T17:41:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/newscenter\/?p=208389"},"modified":"2018-07-03T12:59:52","modified_gmt":"2018-07-03T16:59:52","slug":"jumping-for-joy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/newscenter\/2018\/06\/26\/jumping-for-joy\/","title":{"rendered":"Jumping for Joy"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>With his jump of 7.92 meters, or 26 feet, George Alexandris leapt to victory \u2013 and made Montclair State history \u2013 at the NCAA Division III Outdoor Track and Field Championships at the University of Wisconsin-LaCrosse on May 24.<\/p>\n<p>The first Red Hawk male to win an NCAA title in 25 years, Alexandris broke the 44-year national championship meet record, which was set in 1974 at the first Division III championship. He also broke the Roger Harring Stadium at Veterans Memorial Field Sports Complex record and shattered his own Montclair State record that he had set the week before. In addition, he registered the second-best mark in Division III history.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe feeling of turning in a championship performance is truly magical,\u201d the health and physical education major says. \u201cTo get to this point in time, it took many hardships and experiences that have enabled me to grow into who I am today \u2013 physically, mentally and spiritually. Without God, my family and loved ones, coaches and teammates, none of this would be possible. I am forever thankful.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Alexandris entered the Championship meet with the No. 3 distance in the country. He opened the event with a 7.65-meter jump, which he followed with a 7.72-meter, or 25-feet, 4-inch, leap. For his final record-breaking 7.92-meter jump, he went all out.<\/p>\n<p><iframe title=\"Video: Montclair State Student-Athlete Jumps into History\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/0ntuQSrjOVQ?feature=oembed\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen style=\"width: 500px; height: 281px; border: 0px solid #000;\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>This was transfer student Alexandris\u2019 first season as a Red Hawk. As well as being a long jumper, he also competed in the 100 meter, 200 meter and 4&#215;100 meter relay events.<\/p>\n<p>Alexandris\u2019 achievement is even more impressive since an injury had sidelined him during the season for a month. \u201cI suffered a bad hamstring pull that kept flaring up and being reinjured,\u201d he recalls. \u201cThe team here at Montclair State helped me back with treatment and rehab.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>While he broke the school record at the Coach Pollard Invitational at Moravian on April 14, he did not compete again in the long jump until the Mideast Invitational in May, where he handily overtook the top-ranked competitor to move into the NCAA Championship finals.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cGeorge has truly accomplished something amazing,\u201d says Head XC and Track and Field Coach John Brennan. \u201cGeorge is a young man who has overcome adversity and is a credit to himself and his family.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Alexandris looks forward to continuing to train during the summer. \u201cI see it as a valuable opportunity to get faster, stronger and become a better athlete leading into the next season,\u201d he explains.\u00a0 \u201cI love the fact that I can improve and see how far my body and mind can be pushed. There is no feeling or experience I can draw upon that can be compared to the feeling I get training and competing for the sport of track and field. It\u2019s truly my love and passion.\u201d<\/p>\n<script type=\"text\/javascript\">\n\/\/ Output tags as a list for Google Analytics custom dimension\nwindow.MSU_TagList = [];\n<\/script>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Red Hawk George Alexandris captures national long jump championship<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":208390,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-208389","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-university"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/newscenter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/208389","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/newscenter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/newscenter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/newscenter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/newscenter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=208389"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/newscenter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/208389\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":208403,"href":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/newscenter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/208389\/revisions\/208403"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/newscenter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/208390"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/newscenter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=208389"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/newscenter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=208389"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/newscenter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=208389"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}