The Rancocas Valley girls opened the season with a nice shuttle hurdles win in not ideal conditions Saturday at the Rebel Relays in Howell.

Sophomore Laila Bailey, senior Meet of Champions winner Anabella Chin, senior Sanai Jenkins and sophomore Naveah Lott ran 1:08.22 and won by nearly a second over host Howell, which was 2nd at 1:09.18.

RV’s time is No. 1 in the state after opening weekend, although nobody has seen the Buena Relays results yet and obviously conditions were not ideal to run the shuttles Saturday.

Rancocas Valley scored 86 points to win the Division 2 team title by 25 points over Montgomery, which finished one point ahead of Howell.

RV also won the 800-meter relay in 1:47.20 [sophomore Adrienne Austin, sophomore Leah Howe, senior Jya Marshall, junior Kasey White] and placed 3rd in the 400-meter relay in 50.74 [White, Marshall, senior Olivia Smith, Austin] and 1,600-meter relay in 4:23.91 [Howe, Bailey, Jianna Benton, Sam Mitchell]

Chin and Jenkins also went 1-2 in the intermediates, Chin in 1:07.67 and Jenkins 1:08.42.

In the field, senior Olivia Smith long jumped a PR 16-8 and senior Anaya Young long jumped 16-3 and triple jumped 32-9 ¾ and sophomore Lauren Fadairo triple jumped 32-9 in her first high school meet.

And in the field, senior Ravin Hood threw 103-4 in the discus and 35-6 ¼ in the shot and senior Faith Allen hit 32-4 ¾ and 89-2.

Cherokee graduate Jack Shea, a Northern Arizona senior, won his 5,000 race at the Stanford Invitational Friday night with an outdoor PR.

Shea won the third of five 5,000-meter races at the famed Cobb Track in Palo Alto, Calif., in 13:56.52. He edged former Oklahoma runner Liam Meirow by 6-100ths of a second to cross the line first.

Meirow went out fast and led Shea by 30 meters just 1,000 meters into the race, but Shea ran very steady and closed in 58.33 for his final lap, 2:03.98 for his final 800 and 4:21.18 over his final 1,600 to hold off Meirow – who closed in 57.38 – and secure the win.

Shea’s 400 splits after getting out in 33.04 for the first 200: 68.74,. 67.77, 67.11, 68.36, 68.57, 66.93, 67.98, 70.11, 67.09, 65.65 and 58.33.

Shea’s previous outdoor PR was a 14:08.74 in April of 2018 at the John Clay Invitational in Azusa, Calif.

He ran 13:55.92 indoors at the Husky Classic in February in Seattle.

Rowan’s intermediate hurdles had quite an afternoon Saturday at the Danny Curran Invitational at Widener University in Chester, Pa.

Freshman Treshan Stevenson from Millville, junior John Owens from West Windsor-Plainsboro North and freshman Joe Devito from Jackson Liberty swept the first three spots in the 400IH, with all three moving into the NCAA Division 3 top 20 so far this spring.

Stevenson won the race in 54.52, Owens was just behind in 2nd in 54.69 and Devito ran 55.44 for 3rd.

Considering the chilly, breezy conditions and just how early it is in the season, those are terrific times.

Stevenson ranks 6th in NCAA Division 3, Owens 9th and Devito 19th.

In just his second college intermediate hurdles race, Stevenson broke his PR of 54.66, which he set when he placed 2nd at the state Group 4 race at Franklin last spring. Stevenson ran 55.45 in his first 400IH last month in a home meet in Glassboro.

Owens’ ran with half a second of his collegiate PR of 54.26 which he ran in 2019 at the AARTFC Championships in Cortland, N.Y., in mid-May. Owens ran as fast as 53.30 in high school when he placed 2nd at the state Group 3 meet at Northern Burlington. Rowan didn’t have an outdoor season in 2020 and Owens focused on the long jump last spring and didn’t race the intermediates, so this is the first time he’s competed in the 400IH in three years.

Devito has a collegiate PR of 54.14 from his win at last year’s NJAC meet at Ramapo. He ran 53.93 in high school when he was second in the 2019 Group 3 state meet on his home track in Jackson.

Malachi James is indeed back at Willingboro, but he did not run on the Chimeras’ winning 4-by-200 team Saturday at the Don Danser Relays at Lenape.

Even though the results say he did.

 

 

 

James did indeed transfer from Willingboro to Eastern and back to Willingboro but he’s still dealing with the injury that kept him out of the indoor season and not ready to race just yet.

Willingboro opened the season with an 800-meter relay win at the Don Danser Relays that was notable for who was in the Chimeras’ lineup.

Sophomore Malachi James, the state Group 1 champion at 100 and 200 meters last spring, is listed as running the third leg for Boro, which won the race in chilly, breezy conditions at Lenape in 1:33.00.

James transferred to Eastern over the summer and played football for Eastern this past fall. He did not compete in indoor track, and it’s unclear if he was at Eastern or Willingboro during the winter, but he’s back at Willingboro now.

As a freshman, James ran 10.76 at the Meet of Champions prelims and 21.82 at the County Open. He became the first freshman ever to place in the top eight in the M-of-C in both the 100 and 200.

According to the 4-by-2 results, seniors Miles Allen and Geordan Collins, James and senior Nam Louis Foster ran for Willingboro. We don’t know who actually ran along with Allen, Collins and Foster.

Willingboro had a terrific winter, winning the Group 1 relays and state group meet and placing 14th in the country in the 4-by-200 with a 1:30.96 at Armory Nationals. Allen, Collins, sophomore Jackson Murry and senior Jaylen Young ran on that team.

On Saturday, Young and Murry joined Allen and Collins to run 44.49 on the 4-by-1, and Allen, Collins, Chris Johnson and Murry ran 3:31.76 for a close second to Sterling in the 4-by-4. Murry and Bryon James also won the pole vault relay.

Willingboro also won the shuttle hurdles in 1:08.05 with sophomore Eric Foster, junior Xavier Toliver, sophomore Kedaar Wilson and Johnson anchoring.

Leo Zaccaria of Cape May Tech, Richie Castaneda of Camden Catholic and Gobi Thurairajah of Egg Harbor led Rider to a school record in the 6,000-meter relay Saturday.

Rider placed 4th in 15:55.52 at the Colonial Relays at William and Mary in Williamsburg, Va. Noah Taylor of Twin Valley High in Caernarvon Township, Pa., south of Reading, was the one non-South Jersey leg on Rider’s relay team.

The split section on the official results doesn’t list any splits, but Rider’s four milers averaged 3:58.88 per leg.

The previous school record was 16:05.01 set by the team of Danniel Belay, Cinnaminson’s Tom Long, Kevin Heredia and Scott Ruskan at the 2019 Colonial Relays in Williamsburg.

Castaneda, who didn’t race indoors, also ran 3:54.10 in the open 1,500, Zaccaria ran 3:59.11 and Thurairajah ran 4:01.53.

Bordentown graduate Carson Latham, a Stockton University freshman, recorded two wins and two PRs Saturday at the College of New Jersey Invitational in Ewing.

Latham won the 100 in 10.84 after a 10.85 in the trials and won the 200 in 22.13. It was his first collegiate 100 and his second 200.

Latham’s previous PRs were and 22.15. At Bordentown, he had PRs of 11.12 and 22.65, both from last year’s Burlington County Open at Rancocas Valley. He went on to place 2nd at Group 2 sectionals and at Group 2 states in the 100.

Latham opened his outdoor season last weekend at the Stockton Invitational in Galloway Township with a 22.15 PR in the 200 and also ran on the Ospreys’ 4-by-200 and 4-by-400.

So the 100 was a PR by 28-100ths of a second and the 200 by 2-100ths of a second.

Both his 100 and 200 times are the fastest by a Stockton sprinter in at least 13 years. The TFRRS [Track and Field Results Reporting System] only goes back to 2010, and no Stockton sprinter has run as fast as 10.85 or 22.13 since.

Junior Patrick Ditmars ran a 1:58.09 anchor to lead Cherokee’s all-underclass 4-by-8 to a quick win at the Don Danser Relays at Lenape on Saturday.

Cherokee ran an unpressed 8:08.33, winning the race by about 300 meters.

Junior Thomas Bromley led off with a 2:02.62 split and had already built a 30-meter lead when he came through 400 meters in 58.28.

Junior Conor Jacob followed with a 2:03.32 split, and sophomore Nick Kuenkel, who missed most of XC and all of indoor with an injury, followed with a 2:0430 split in his first race since Oct. 2.

That set up Ditmars, the Burlington County XC champ this past fall, who went out in 56.34 running solo on his way to a 1:58.09 anchor.

It’s Cherokee’s fastest opening-weekend 4-by-8 since 1999, when Mike Urbanovich, Dave Sitzer, Mike Caputi and Aaron Boucher ran 7:59.3 at the 1999 Hall of Fame Relays in Maple Shade, the precursor to the Don Danser Relays. It’s also the fastest time at the meet since then.

 

 

Thomas Bromley 2:02.62

Conor Jacob 2:03.32

Nick Kuenkel 2:04.30

Patrick Ditmars 1:58.09

8:08.33

Haddon Township graduate Jake Aylmer turned in a huge 1,500 PR Saturday morning.

Aylmer won the 1,500 at the Ramapo College Invitational in Mahwah in 4:05.60, edging teammate Ronnie Melao by a stride. Melao was second in 4:05.93.

Aylmer closed in 62.07 for his final 400 and 2:08.54 for his final 800. His previous 1,500 PR was a 4:11.71 last spring in a meet at Rowan University in Glassboro. He ran 4:11.98 last month in his season opener at Rowan.

His time is No. 3 so far this spring in the Middle Atlantic Conference.

Stevens is an NCAA Division 3 school located in Hoboken. 

 

The Rowan men’s track team is No. 3 in the country in the initial NCAA Division 3 ranking, largely because of its javelin throwers.

The team rankings are determined on a weekly basis using a point system based on event-by-event rankings. So the more athletes a program has ranked near the top of the D-3 performance list, the higher that program will be ranked.

And Rowan? The Profs currently have the top throwers in the country, four of the top eight and five of the top 17.

Sophomore Greg Poloso of Wayne Valley and junior Dan McAleavey of Howell both surpassed 220 feet in Rowan’s season-opener, the Oscar Moore Invitational in Glassboro last weekend. Poloso won the event with a huge PR throw of 222-9 and McAleavey threw 220-2.

Both surpassed the Rowan new-jav record of 219-4 set in 1992 by Burlington City High graduate Mike Boone.

Rowan’s old-jav record is the legendary 273-2 by Hopatcong High graduate Mike Juskus at the NCAA Division 1 Championships at LSU in Baton Rouge in 1981. Juskus was a baseball player in high school (as well as football, wrestling and bowling) and never touched a javelin until he arrived at Rowan as a freshman. He wound up winning three NCAA Division 3 titles and two NCAA Division 1 titles (back when D-3 winners were invited to the D-1 meet).

Freshman Lane Owens from Ocean City ranks 6th nationally with his 198-3 at the Washington & Lee Carnival in Lexington, Va., last month, and junior Edgar Rosa from Paulsboro is 8th with a 193-11, also in Lexington. Sophomore Julio Lebron of Memorial of West New York threw 184-4 at the Oscar Moore Invite for 17th so far in D-3.

Poloso is a transfer from Rider, where he threw 204-8 as a freshman in the spring of 2019 – the No. 2 mark in school history (behind Anthony Ragusa, who threw 212-5 in 2019). He competed in one meet for Rider last spring and didn’t get a legal mark.

McAleavey’s previous PR was a 206-6 when he placed second at last year’s NCAA Division 3 National Championships in Greensboro, N.C.

Owens’ 198-3 came in his first college meet and marked a more than 10-foot PR. His best throw in high school was 187-6 at the 2019 South Jersey Invitational at Delsea.

Rosa was a JUCO All-America in the hammer, javelin and discus in the spring of 2019 and won the NJCCA Division 3 national title in the javelin at 182-2 at Mohawk Valley Community College in Utica, N.Y. His PR is 197-4 from the Fast Times Before Finals at Rowan last May.

And Lebron has a PR of 194-1 from a meet at Central Florida in Orland from the spring of 2019. He threw 193-7 last year and was also 2nd in the NJAC decathlon last spring with 5,038 points.