The Illinois men’s track and field team stuck with some tough competition to garner a number of personal bests Saturday at the LSU Invitational in Baton Rouge, La. The Illini scored 111 points, finishing fourth among the field of six teams that included No. 2 Texas A&M; and No. 5 LSU.

The Illini’s three event victories came from the distance crew: Chris DeSilva in the 3,000 meter steeplechase, Kyle Engnell in the 1,500 meters and Colin Mickow in the 5,000.

“The distance field didn’t turn out to be quite as competitive as we had hoped they were,” interim head coach Mike Turk said. “Now having said that, those victories that we got in those events were really fine performances.”

DeSilva’s personal-best time of 8 minutes, 57.51 seconds put the junior into Illinois’ all-time top-10 list in the event — he ranks fourth in the NCAA this season.

“It’s early in the season, so hopefully I’ll keep running faster and moving down the list,” DeSilva said. “But it’s certainly kind of cool to be on a school-history list.”

The St. Charles, Ill., native dropped nearly 10 seconds off last weekend’s time of 9:07.32.

“It was great to see that out of Chris,” Turk said. “Against some weak competition he really was dominant, and ran a smart race to do that.”

Engnell edged out teammate Graham Farnsworth by just six hundredths of a second with a personal-best time of 3:49.29 in the 1,500.

“Me and Graham Farnsworth were planning on running a smart race and we knew from our indoor season that we could close hard,” Engnell said. “I think we accomplished our goals in the race, and it was really nice to PR.”

Coming off the indoor season, Engnell said he feels great and is happy to run a personal best early in the season.

“I feel like right now I’m in the best shape I ever have been,” Engnell said. “It can only mean good things for the rest season.”

Another one-two finish for the Illini came in the 5,000, as Mickow ran a time of 15:15.86 to finish ahead of sophomore Nathan Bohne. The Illini distance crew combined to score 46 of Illinois’ 111 points.

“It was exciting, everyone was dropping PRs,” DeSilva said. “And last week the performances weren’t quite as good, so it was good see everyone running PRs and build momentum in the season.”

The Orange and Blue’s pole vault crew posted strong performances despite a major setback. Due to shipping delay, the Illini failed to receive their poles in time for Saturday’s meet and had to borrow poles of a different brand and different type than they were used to. Freshmen Matt Bane and Cody Klein finished second and fifth with heights of 5.09 meters and 4.94, respectively, and teammate Steve Monte placed 12th.

“For three young guys to have the composure to use poles they’ve never used, and then to be able to go out there that day and put it together and vault well,” Turk said. “That was just incredible and for me that was probably the performance of the meet, those three guys being able to do that.”

Some of the toughest competition for the Illini came in the sprints, which brought out some strong performances as well. Juniors Andrew Riley and Stanley Azie recorded personal bests in the 100 meters, placing fifth and seventh, respectively. Riley also placed second in the 110-meter hurdles and helped the 4×100 meter relay group finish second in his first meet this outdoor season.

Illinois added a meet to the schedule for next weekend and will head to Columbia, Mo., for the Tom Botts Invitational.

“We’re going to take a big group there,” Turk said. “It’ll be a great opportunity for a lot of the guys who haven’t traveled in last couple weeks to go out and open their season and show what kind of progress they’ve been making in their training.”