Washington Township graduate Isabelle Deal, a freshman at Ursinus College in suburban Philadelphia, earned All-America honors Thursday with an 8th-place finish at the NCAA Division 3 National Championships.
Deal, seeded No. 16, threw 135-1 on her sixth and final throw. That’s just 17 inches short of her personal best of 136-6, which she set when she won the Centennial Conference Championships on May 1 at Mulhenberg College in Allentown.
On Thursday outside Belk Stadium on the North Carolina A&T campus in Greensboro, N.C., Deal opened with a throw of 134-6 and then hit 122-6 and 128-9 to reach the finals. After a foul, she threw 123-5 before her 135-1.
Deal finished as the No. 2 freshman in the country, behind only Anna Swanson of St. Mary’s University in Winona, Minn., who was second at 153-1.
I’d love to give you some context on Deal’s performance, but the Ursinus web site does not have a list of track All-Americans or NCAA placers.
Deal’s high school PR was 126-9 when she won the 2019 South Jersey Group 4 sectional title at her home track in Turnersville.
From the Backstretch by Reuben Frank 