The St. John’s track and field team finished 10th at the Big East Indoor Championships on Feb. 18, the team’s first Top 10 finish at the event since 2006.

St. John’s racked up 38 points en route to their finish at the Championships. Senior Priscilla Frederick won her very first Big East title in the high jump, beating out Connecticut’s Natasha McLaren. Frederick cleared at 1.79 meters, ahead of McLaren’s 1.75-meter finish.

“Today was a tremendous conclusion to a terrific weekend for St. John’s,” head coach Jim Hurt said. “The team exhibited their best efforts of the season on the biggest stage, and we rallied behind each other. I couldn’t be more proud of our effort and dedication.”

Frederick ended up as the Red Storm’s overall leading scorer, pulling in 18 of the team’s 38 points. She finished second in the pentathlon with a score of 3,784 which ranks 25th in the nation.

Sophomore Molly Ellis came from behind to win the 400-meter dash, finishing two-hundredths of a second over Villanova’s Christie Verdier.

According to coaches, Ellis was instructed to stay behind the pack until she was ready to make a late surge. Ellis’ 55.04 time marked a career-best for Ellis and put her sixth all time in program history. Her win was also the team’s first in the 400 meters in Big East Indoor history.

Senior Bintou Dibba and redshirt sophomore Aryon Trujillo each finished with All-Big East selections. Dibba was awarded for the first time in her career for her eighth-place finish in the long jump, with a leap of 5.59 meters.

Trujillo was awarded for a career-best time in the 1,000 meters. Trujillo finished eighth with a time of 2:57.72 after only starting running distance earlier this month.

Junior captain Chanel King placed fifth in the weight throw with a 17.30-meter toss and 12th in the shot put with 12.82 meters, the best finish of her career.

The Red Storm rounded out their scoring with a fifth-place finish in the 4X800-meter relay. The relay team of seniors Sarah Sudbury, and Kim Piard,  redshirt sophomore Nicole Cocozza and redshirt freshman Michelle Duffy finished with a time of 9:03:67, coming within a second of breaking a school record set last year.

St. John’s now has 14 athletes who have qualified for the ECAC Indoor Championships which will take place March 5 in Boston, Mass.