From the Backstretch by Reuben Frank

Jaidah Garrett is off to a fast start to her freshman year at UConn, with a triple jump PR and near-PR in the long jump in her first outdoor meet.

Garrett, from Absegami, jumped 19-3 ½ and 39-7 ¼ in the Huskies’ season opener in Myrtle Beach, S.C.

Indoors, she jumped 19-5 ½ in a meet in Cambridge, Mass., and only triple jumped twice, with a season best of 37-2 ¼ at the Big East Championships in Chicago. She placed 4th in the long jump [19-3 ½] and 7th in the triple at the conference meet as a freshman.

In high school, Garrett had PRs of 19-7 ¾ at West Philly Nationals at Franklin Field this past June with a legal 0.6 meters-per-second wind. Her high school triple jump PR was 38-6 at Delsea in May. No wind guage for that meet. Her three-best high school marks were made in meets without a wind guage. Her best wind-legal triple at Absegami was a 37-9 ½ at the state Group 3 meet at Delsea with a 1.8 wind reading.

So her 39-7 ¼ in Myrtle Beach was officially a nearly two-foot PR. The wind was 1.1 on that jump and minus-1.6 on her 19-3 ½.

Garrett is now 4th-best in the Big East in the triple jump this year and 3rd in the long jump. The 39-7 ¼ is 10th-best on the all-time South Jersey alumni list and No. 2 among Abegami graduates. Mariah Hubbard of Monmouth, a four-time Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference champion, jumped 40-5 at the 2019 ECAC Championships at Boston University.

Unfortunately, UConn is one of the few Division 1 schools that doesn’t have an all-time top-10 performance list on its web site. That’s lame, UConn, get your act together!

Rider sophomore Cortland Webb from Highland won his season-opening race Saturday, running 55.30 in the 400-meter intermediates at the Rider Six-Way Invitational in Lawrenceville.

Webb won by nearly a second over Simon Advento of Marist University in Poughkeepsie, who ran 56.28.

It was Webb’s first race over hurdles since he placed 5^th in last year’s Metro Atlantic Conference meet on the same track at Rider this past May.

Webb PR’d with a 54.50 in the prelims of the conference meet.

Webb is currently No. 2 in the MAC behind Thomas Bonsignore of Manhattan, who ran 55.15 last weekend in a meet in Coral Gables, Fla.

Next for Rider is the Sam Howell Invitational Saturday at Princeton’s Weaver Stadium.

Ryan Merlino moved up to No. 8 in Rutgers history Saturday with a lifetime-best 16-8 ¼ clearance at the Central Florida Knights Invitational in Orlando.

Merlino, an Oakcrest graduate, cleared 16-8 ¼ on his 2^nd attempt and placed 2^nd to All-America teammate Brian Sullivan from Hillsborough, who cleared 18-1.

Merlino’s previous outdoor PR was 16-4 ¾ at the South Florida Invite in Tampa earlier this month. His lifetime best was 16-8 indoors at the Big Ten Championships in Indianapolis in February.

On Saturday, Merlino passed through 15-5 and then cleared 16-2 ½ on his 1^st attempt and 16-8 ¼ on his 2^nd. He took three attempts at a new PR of 17-0 ¼.

Rutgers’ other South Jersey pole vaulter, Cherry Hill East’s Noah Kreisman, has a PR of 17-3 ½ but hasn’t competed since late January at the Ott Center.

In his first outdoor college race, Tennesseee freshman Alexander Osayemi ripped an intermediate hurdles PR Saturday in Starkville, Miss.

Osayemi’s PR coming into the meet was a 52.70 from this past June at the Meet of Champions at Pennsauken as part of a wild triple that saw him win the 400 in a meet-record 46.08, place 3^rd in the 200 in 21.43 and take 2^nd in the 400 hurdles.

On Saturday, at the Alumni Bulldog Relays at Mississippi State, he ran 52.63 and placed 3^rd in the Vols’ season opener.

That makes him 7^th-fastest in the SEC so far this spring and 3^rd-fastest freshman. He’s also now 10^th-fastest freshman in NCAA Division 1. He was No. 13 freshman in D-1 indoors with his 46.80 for 400 meters. Osayemi also earned All-America honors for his relay work on Tennessee’s 4-by-4 at the NCAA Championships in Fayetteville.

His time is No. 26 among U.S. men so far this year. If he’s eligible for Under-20 Nationals – which means he’d have to turn 20 after New Year’s Eve – he’s No. 2 on the U.S. Under-20 list. World Athletics does not list a birthday for him.

Ajani Dwyer ran the fastest all-conditions 100-meter dash in the world this year at the Central Florida Knights Invitational in Orlando.

Dwyer, a Penn State sophomore from Washington Township, ran 9.96 but with a wind reading of 2.2 meters per second, just above the 2.0 limit for performances to be eligible for records and all-time lists.

According to the wind correction calculator, that equals a 10.10 with no wind or a 9.96 with the maximum allowable 2.0.

The fastest 100 in the world this year under any wind conditions is the 10.00 that Australian teenager Gout Gout ran at the Queensland Sport and Athletics Center in Nathan, Brisbane, on Feb. 21.

There were no semifinals, so Dwyer only had the one chance to race the 100 Saturday in Orlando. He didn’t run the 200.

Dwyer’s legal PR is a 10.16 with a 0.5 wind reading from last year’s Big Ten Championships in Eugene this past May. He’s run a legal 20.51 twice, one indoors and once with a 0.8.

The 9.96 is fastest by any New Jersey sprinter since eight-time Olympic gold medalist Carl Lewis ran 9.86 at the 1991 World Championships in Tokyo with a legal 1.2 wind.

Penn State’s school record is 10.15 by Ramapo transfer and Olympian Cheickna Traore at the NCAA first round qualifier in Lexington, Ky., in May 2024. Dwyer’s 9.96 is not eligible for school record purposes.

But the NCAA does not differentiate between wind-legal and wind-aided times, and Dwyer’s time obviously is fastest in college track this year.

Dwyer ran 10.32 at Washington Township, PR’ing at West Philly Nationals

Huge intermediate hurdles PR for Timber Creek graduate Nasir Ali Saturday at the Raleigh Relays.

In his first outdoor race for Chicago State after spending last year at Long Island University, Ali ran 53.39, lowering his PR nearly a full second.

Ali’s best time in his one year at LIU was 54.23 in a meet last April in Storrs, Conn. He placed 2^nd in the Northeast Conference Championships in Easton, Mass., with a 54.71.

Ali resurfaced this indoor season at Chicago State and ran 49.17 indoors in a meet in Chicago. This was his first outdoor race competing for the Cougars.

There’s no all-time performance list on the Chicago State web site – come, Chicago State sports information people, get on the ball. They do list  a school record of 52.52 in the 400 hurdles set last year by Raymond Oriakhi, although TFRRS shows his fastest time as 52.73 with no sign of a 52.52. Oriakhi is now at Pitt.

At Timber Creek, Ali had a 400IH best of 55.09 from 2024 Group 3 Sectionals at Delsea and a 400 best of 48.96, also in a meet at Delsea.

Aliya Garozzo ran the fastest 400-meter hurdles race ever by a South Jersey woman Saturday at the Raleigh Relays on Paul Derr Track on the North Carolina State campus.

Garozzo, a Paul VI graduate who competed for Penn and then Duke, won the 400 hurdles in 55.69, smashing her PR of 55.77, which she ran last April at Duke in nearby Durham.

Her time is No. 2 in the world this year, behind only four-time Australian champion Sarah Carli, who ran 55.36 in Perth last month.

The only faster woman from New Jersey over the 400-meter hurdles is world record holder and four-time Olympic gold medalist Sydney McLaughlin, who ran 50.37 in Paris when she won the 2024 Olympic gold medal.

Garozzo gave an indication of her fitness level when she PRd at 400 meters in February indoors at Clemson with a 52.43. That made her 26^th-fastest American woman this past indoor season.

Garozzo broke the meet record of 57.05 set in 1995 by Rebecca Russell, running unattatched, and broke the facility record of 55.75 set in 2021 by Andrenette Knight of Virginia. Braelyn Baker, Garozzo’s former Duke teammate, was 2^nd with a personal-best 55.77. Baker and Garozzo both ran on Duke’s 4-by-4 team that placed 5^th at NCAAs last June at Hayward Field.

All-Time South Jersey 400-Meter Hurdles Top-10
55.69 … Aliya Garozzo [Paul VI], March 28, 2026, Raleigh, N.C.
55.78 … Tonya Lee [Rancocas Valley], April 21, 1996, Walnut, Calif.

55.99 … Natalie Dumas [Eastern], June 20, Philadelphia
56.11 … Arianna Smith [Pennsville], May 17, 2025, Norfolk, Va.
56.21 … Krystal Cantey [Winslow Twp.], May 26, 2007, Gainesville, Fla.
56.87 … Evann Thompson [Lenape], May 30, 2014, Jacksonville, Fla.
57.16 … Jewel Ash [Eastern], May 9, 2022, High Point, N.C.
57.31 … Danielle Myricks [Willingboro], May 19, 2002, Columbia, Mo.

57.31 … Eusheka Bartley [Highland], May 29, 1996, Atlanta
58.28 … Nylah Perry [Winslow], May 27, 2023, Sacramento, Calif.

Anthony Barber, an Arcadia freshman from Burlington Township, threw a javelin PR on the first throw of his first college meet and then added three more PRs before his day was over.

What a college debut for the former Falcon!

Barber PR’d on each of his first three throws and and again on his 6^th attempt and placed 3^rd at the Danny Curren Invitational at Widener University in Chester, Pa.

His PR coming into his college debut was 175-7 when he placed 6^th in his last high school meet, the Meet of Champions at Pennsauken last June.

On Saturday, he threw 179-4, 179-8 and 180-3 on his first three attempts and then finished with a 181-5 for his 4^th PR of the afternoon.

The 181-5 is the best throw by an Arcadia freshman as far back as TFRRS goes back, which is 2010. A lot of those years Arcadia doesn’t seem to have had a track team. I’ll go out on a limb and say it’s a school freshman record. Can’t tell you what the school record is. Arcadia is one of a very small number of colleges that doesn’t list school records

Tey’ana Ames came within 3 ¼ inches of the Rutgers shot put record Saturday with a PR at the Central Florida Knights Invitational in Orlando.

Ames, a Rutgers senior from Atlantic County Tech, threw 53-1 ¾ on her final attempt, falling just shy of the Rutgers school record of 53-5 set by Jasmine Van Note of Sayreville at the 2022 Big Ten Championships in Minneapolis.

Indoors, Ames PR’d with a 52-9 ½ at the Tyson Invitational in Fayetteville, Ark., last month. That’s also No. 2 in Rutgers history, behind Van Note’s 54-5 ¼ at the Armory in 2023.

Ames is No. 3 in That’s No. 3 in South Jersey history, behind Jessica Woodard of Cherokee [63-7 ¾ in Tucson in 2021] and Jamine Moton of Delsea [58-6 ¼ in Clemson, S.C., in 2001]. She’s No. 9 all-time among New Jersey women.

In her first college race over the 100-meter high hurdles, Washington Township’s Dakota Jones broke the NJIT school record.

Jones ran 14.69, breaking the New Jersey Institute of Technology record of 14.78 set by Oluanifemi Olufowobi at a meet in Durham, N.H., this past May.

Jones ran 14.69 to win the event at the Danny Curren Invitational at Widener University in Chester, Pa. Teammate Kayla Kelsick from Science Park in Newark. Kelsick ran 14.78, tying the previous school record.

One of NJIT’s assistant coaches is Jerome Robinson, the 1986 state Group 1 high jump champion for Bordentown.

Jones ran 14.41 with an assisting wind of 2.2 meters per second at South Jersey Group 4 sectionals last year at Pennsauken, but her wind-legal PR is 14.54 from 2024 West Philly Nationals at Franklin Field.