AFTER 10 days and 10 sports, the University of the West Indies Mona Campus took top spot as the curtains comes down on the 28th staging of the UWI Games held at the UWI Mona Bowl in Jamaica.

The institution’s campuses of Cave Hill, Barbados; Mona, Jamaica; and St Augustine, Trinidad competed against each other over a 10-day multi-sport championship featuring fierce performances and social integration among the schools.

Mona narrowly secured the title from the defending champions Cave Hill Campus. Amassing 96 points overall Mona, Jamaica, won the UWI Games 2013 by taking first place in several disciplines including track and field, netball, men’s football, table tennis, men’s volleyball and women’s basketball.

Mona is closely followed by previous winners Cave Hill, Barbados, with 92 points. Following eight days of gruelling competition, Cave Hill won the cricket, hockey, women’s volleyball and tennis titles.

The UWI, Mona, victory was a hard one, as it came down to the last game of the competition men’s hockey, to which Mona placed second overall, giving them the four-point lead to win UWI Games 2013.

St Augustine was not to be outdone as they made their mark on the competition with impressive victories in the swimming competition as well as women’s football scoring 64 points overall.

The 2013 edition of the UWI Games has gone down as one of the most fiercely contested multi-discipline event as the rivalry between hosts UWI Mona and UWI Cave Hill reached fever-pitch.

Dalton Myers, director of sports for UWI, Mona expressed his satisfaction on hosting a successful event. “It was not without challenges, however, all the team have put out an impressive performance throughout the competition, the results show that the talent in the university community is improving. We broke some previous records and crowned some new champions this year.”

The UWI Games, which originated in the 1960s as the inter-campus games, has been ongoing biennially among the three main university campuses, Cave Hill, Barbados, St Augustine, Trinidad and Mona, Jamaica.

According to Horton Dolphin, Head of Academy of Sports UWI Cave Hill, the rivalry served for good competition in the end. “It has been an amazing 10 days of fun, athleticism and all the other adjectives you can think of. I think the over 400 student athletes who competed this year experienced good, keen competition and I am sure everyone had a good time, and that is what the UWI Games are all about,” said Dolphin.