From the Backstretch by Reuben Frank

David Brown became Rowan’s 1^st freshman national champion in 44 years Friday when he won the high jump at the NCAA Division 3 Championships in Wisconsin.

Brown clinched the title before he had a miss.

Brown, who graduated from Edison High a year ago, locked up in a terrific competition with junior Lukas Nowlin of the Univerity of Southwestern Texas in Georgetown, Texas.

Both were clean up through 6-11 ½, but Nowlin – who entered the meet with a 6-10 ¾ PR before PR’ing at 6-11 ½ – finally missed at 7-0 ½ and Brown cleared on his 1^st attempt to take the lead.

He’s Rowan’s first freshman to win an outdoor national title since Willie Lawson from Plainfield won the 800 in 1982 in Naperville, Ill.

After he secured the win, Brown missed three tries at  7-3, which would have surpassed his PR of 7-2 ¼ and broken the school record he shares with Jeffrey Tucker of Eastern, who cleared 7-2 ¼ at Moravian College in Bethlehem in April 2018.

Brown, junior Jamile Gantt from Paulsboro and sophomore Noah Wampole from Radnor, Pa., all earned All-America honors with their top-eight finishes.  Rowan finished 1-3-4 for 21 points in the one event.

This is Gantt’s 4^th All-America performance. He was 7^th outdoors in 2024 at 6-9 ¾, 3^rd outdoors last year at 6-11 and 4^th indoors this past winter at 6-10 ¼. Wampole is now a three-time All-America after placing 6^th both outdoors last year and indoors this year. Brown is a double All-America after placing 3^rd this winter.

Wampole cleared 6-6, 6-8 and 6-9 on his 1^st attempt, 6-10 ¼ on his second and 6-11 ½ on his 3rd. Gantt had a miss at 6-8 but cleared 6-9 on his 1^st jump and 6-10 ¼ on his 2^nd.

A 4^th Rowan jumper, sophomore Damarion Potts from South Brunswick, cleared 6-8 and placed 14^th. Rutgers-Camden freshman Jaylen Deleon from Highland cleared 6-6 and was the 3^rd freshman in the competition.

Haddonfield’s Dylan Hosty, already the fastest freshman in South Jersey this year in the 800, 1,600 and 3,200, is now also the fastest freshman in the 400.

Hosty continued to display her remarkable range Thursday by running 57.02 to win the 400 at the Baker Invitational on her home track.

She’s already run 2:08.12 for 800 meters at the Camden County Championships earlier this month at Haddon Township, 4:49.48 full mile at the Penn Relays and 10:55.34 last month in Colts Neck.

Hosty’s 800 is a South Jersey freshman record, her mile is No. 2 behind Haddonfield’s Briana Gess [4:45.97 in 2014], her 3,200 is 7^th-fastest among South Jersey freshmen.

Hosty is the No. 1 seed in the 800 at the state Group 2 meet and No. 2 seed in the 1,600.

The top-seeded Rowan 1,600-meter relay team cruised into the finals of the 1,600-meter relay at the NCAA Division 3 Championship in Wisconsin.

The Profs, with three South Jersey legs, ran 3:11.35 and will race in the final at 6 p.m. Saturday.

Rowan ranks No. 1 in NCAA Division 3 with its 3:08.97 in a meet at Widener in Chester, Pa., last week.

Freshman Marquis Taylor from Woodbury and sophomore Samuel Agbessi from Sterling ran the first two legs, junior  Teddy Wilson from Toms River North split 48.26 on the 3^rd leg and junior Dallas Hohney from Glassboro anchored in 46.42.

Rowan has the option of using freshman Rajhan Dixon, the NCAA Division 3 indoor 200 champ, in the final.

The College of New Jersey also advanced for the final with a 3:11.76, giving the New Jersey Athletic Conference two qualifiers.

Rowan’s Eli Hendricks, a junior from Penns Groec, Rajahn Dixon, a sophomore from Eastern, and Evan Corcoran, a senior from Kingsway, were all among the five-fastest qualifiers Thursday for the final in the 200-meter dash trials at the NCAA Division 3 Championships in Wisconsin.

Hendricks ran 20.99 into a 1.5-meters-per-second headwind and was the 2^nd-fastest qualifier, Dixon ran 21.06 into a 0.5 headwind and was 3^rd-fastest and Corcoran ran 21.25 with a 1.1 headwind.

All three won their heats and advanced to the final as “large-Q” qualifiers. The final is scheduled for 4:50 p.m. Saturday at Veterans Memorial Stadium in La Crosse, Wisc.

Hendricks was the No. 7 seed with a season-best 20.95 coming into the meet, Dixon was No. 12 with a 21.02 and Corcoran was No. 17 with a 21.09, so all raced well above their seeding.

Also Thursday, sophomore Samuel Agbessi from Sterling advanced in the 400-meter hurdles with a 52.62. The final is 4:25 p.m. Saturday.

Rowan’s national title hopes were dealt a blow when their four long jumpers failed to score.

Ocean City’s Elaina Styer, a Stockton sophomore, is off to a flying start in the heptathlon at the NCAA Division 3 Championships in La Crosse, Wisc.

Styer leads the heptathlon after two events at Veterans Memorial Stadium.

In the opening hurdles, Styer ran 14.40 for 923 points. That’s not far off her PR and school-record 14.22.

In the high jump at Veterans Memorial Stadium, Styer earned 759 points after clearing 5-3 ¾. She opened by clearing 4-9 ¾ on her 1st attempt, then passed 4-11 and cleared 5-0 ¼ on her 1st attempt, 5-1 ¼ and 5-2 ½ on her 2nd attempt and 5-3 ¾ on her 1st. She was one of only three women to clear 5-3 ¾.

The heptathlon continues with the shot put and 200 later Thursday and then the long jump, javelin and 800 on Friday.

Styer, 2nd in the pentathlon at indoor NCAAs in Birmingham, Ala., PR’d with 5,050 points in her most recent heptathlon last month in Ewing.

Pleasantville’s Irvin Marable III won the 400-meter hurdles and broke the Wilmington (Del.) school record in the 800-meter run at the CACC Championships in Lakewood.

Marable, a Wilmington sophomore, ran 1:55.94 at the Central Atlantic Collegiate Conference meet, breaking his season-best of 1:58.16 from an indoor meet in January at the Ott Center. He ran 1:59.06 in his only previous outdoor 800, in Baltimore last month. An article on the school’s web site doesn’t say what the previous school record was.

Marable placed 2nd in the behind Bridgeport sophomore Edoardo Vandelli, who ran 1:52.65.

It looks like Marable ran for Lincoln University in Lower Oxford Township, hester County, and Coffeyville (Kans.) JUCO landing at Wilmington. He ran his PR 1:54.66 in a meet in Mount Olive, N.C., in his final race for Lincoln in May 2023.

Marable won the 400-meter hurdles in 54.94 and then set a PR of 54.40 at a last-chance meet in West Chester.

Marable also anchored Wilmington’s 3rd-place 4-by-4 team, which ran 3:18.41.

Wilmington sophomore Julian Rich from Camden County Tech won the steeplechase in a personal-best 10:15.17.

Delsea graduate Elisia Lancaster moved into the No. 15 spot on the 2026 U.S. hammer throw list with a 225-1 in a meet in Glassboro. Lancaster’s previous PR was a 222-7 from a meet in Princeton in May of 2025.

Lancaster ranks 65th in the world and No. 56 on the all-time U.S. list. She’s hit the B standard for the USATF Championships in New York July 23-26. The auto standard is 232-0.

Lancaster began her college career at Rowan College at Gloucester County, where she was a multiple JUCO national champion in the shot, discus and hammer and then she spent a year at Towson before finishing at Southern Illinois, where she earned All-America honors indoors in the weight throw and was a Missouri Valley Conference champ in the hammer.

She threw 220-4 at Southern Illinois in May of 2022, improving to 222-7 as a post-grad in 2004 and now 225-1.

Princeton freshman Anthony Liakhnovich from Hammonton recorded a couple big PRs at the Ivy League Championships this past weekend.

Liakhnovich placed 5th in the discus with a 177-3 and 6th in the shot put with a 58-5 ¾. His previous PRs were both made at Penn – 171-8 from last month at the Penn Relays and 58-5 ¼ from an indoor meet at the Ott Center. He was the top freshman in the shot and No. 2 freshman in the disc.

Liakhnovich is just 19 inches off the all-time Princeton top-10 in the discus and 5 ¼ inches off in the shot put.

He’s No. 7 on the all-time South Jersey alumni list in the discus and No.8 in the shot put.

Liakhnovich also plays football at Old Nassau and is listed on the roster as a 6-foot-6, 265-pound offensive lineman.

Millville’s Leah Howard PR’d in the javelin at a recent meet in Waco, Texas, throwing 165-1, which ranks 43rd among U.S. women this year and 26th in the NCAA West Region.

That guarantees her a spot in the NCAA West Region Prelims May 27-30 in Fayetteville, Ark.

Howard’s previous PR was a 164-4, also in Waco, in May of 2024. Her 165-1 ranks 8th all-time on the South Jersey Alumni Performance List and is No. 3 in Texas Tech history.

Howard also placed 5th in the Big 12 Championships in Tucson this past weekend with a 157-5 on her 1st throw.

Delaware junior Kadence Dumas ran the 2nd-fastest 800 in University of Delaware history with a 3rd-place finish at the Conference USA Championships in Murfreesboro, Tenn.

Dumas, from Eastern, lowered her PR more than a second – from 2:07.30 to 2:06.29 – in the finals of the 800 after a 2:09.77 in the qualifying round.

Her time is No. 11 on the all-time South Jersey list and No. 2 on the all-time Delaware performance list, behind a 2:04.82 by Holly Manning in the 2021 NCAA Division 1 East Prelims in Jacksonville.

Dumas finished behind only Liberty’s Allie Zealand, who won the race in 2:05.26, and Privilllege Chikara of Middle Tennessee, who was 2nd in 2:05.53.

Dumas is also No. 5 in Delaware history indoors at 500 meters [1:14.92], 2nd in the 600 [1:33.15], 3rd indoors in the 800 [2:11.03], 7th in the 1,000 [2:55.83] and 7th outdoors in the 400 [55.37].

The 3rd-place finish is Dumas’s highest ever in a conference meet. She was 4th in the 800 at the indoor conference meet in Lynchburg.