Kylie Anicic, racing off her XC peak, shattered the Edinboro school record in the 5,000 Friday at the Grand Valley State Universitry Holiday Open at State-Laker Fieldhouse in Allendale, Mich.

Anicic, a Kingsway graduate, ran 16:26.23, finishing 12 meters behind Western Michigan’s Makayla Perez, who ran 16:23.94. Perez, a Michigan transfer, has run as fast as 16:01.57 outdoors.

Anicic’s time is No. 1 in NCAA Division 2 so far this indoor season and a provisional qualifier for the NCAA Division 2 Championships in Virginia Beach in March.

Just seven days earlier, Anicic earned All-America honors with a 31st-place finish in the NCAA Division 2 cross country championships at Chambers Bay Golf Course in University Place, Wash., where she ran 21:14 for 6,000 meters.

Anicic’s previous 5,000 best was 16:39.84 when she won the Mountaineer Twilight in Morgantown, W. Va. Her indoor 5,000 PR was 16:47.87 at a home meet in Edinboro’s Zafirovski Rec Center in February.

Anicic broke the school record of 16:44.22 set by Rachael Lanzel when she won the 2009 Pennsylvania State Athletic Conference Championships at East Stroudsburg.

Paul VI grad Aliya Garozzo blasted a hot 600 to open her sophomore year at Penn Friday at Ocean Breeze in Staten Island.

Garozzo, who dipped under a minute in the 400-meter intermediates as a Penn freshman, ran 1:32.49 Friday to win the three-lap event at the Seahawk Shootout.

It was the first lifetime 600 for Garozzo, who ran 1:13.98 for 500 meters last winter and lowered her 400 PR to 56.31 last spring.

Garozzo led a Penn sweep of the first five places in the race. Sophomore Isabella Whitaker was second in 1:32.64

Garozzo ran 59.76 to place second in the 400IH the Ivy League Championships in New Haven in May.

Here’s a new one: The Penn women’s track “history and record” book doesn’t include school records! https://s3.amazonaws.com/penn.sidearmsports.com/documents/2020/3/25/Women_s_Track_Field_Fact_Book.pdf

Garozzo’s bio page on Penn’s web site hasn’t been updated in two years, and the Penn women’s track page hasn’t been updated since May.

 

Quite collegiate debut for Stockton freshman Connor Wright of Hammonton, who popped four lifetime bests on his way to winning the long jump at the College of New Jersey Indoor Open at the Armory over the weekend.

Wright had a huge series, opening with a 22-3 ¼, then hitting 22-9, 22-10 and 22-9 again with a couple fouls mixed in there as well. Wright averaged 22-7 ¾ on his four legal jumps.

He finished just ahead of Princeton’s Illay Furman, who jumped 22-7 ¾ on his final attempt of the competition.

At Hammonton, Wright had a PR of 22-2 ¼ outdoors at the Eagle Relays this past April at Central Regional in Bayville. His indoor PR was 22-0 ½ from the Meet of Champions in March at the Bubble in Toms River, where he placed 5th.

So his average jump on four attempts Saturday was 5 ½ inches beyond his PR coming into the meet.

Wright ranks No. 8 in NCAA Division 3 one weekend into the 2022-23 season, and his jump is best so far by a NJAC athlete.

It’s also the best mark by a Stockton jumper since nine-time All-America and two-time NCAA Division 3 triple jumper Jared Lewis went 23-7 ¼ at a meet in 2018 at Shippensburg.

Stockton’s long jump record of 24-8 ½ was set in 1988 at Smith College in Northampton, Mass., as part of a horizontal jumps double by Shawnee graduate Greg Foster, whose son Greg won the 60-meter hurdles at the same meet Saturday in his first race for Princeton.

Pennsauken graduate Jade Pope, a sophomore at DePaul in Chicago, won the 400 with an indoor collegiate PR over the weekend in her season opener.

Pope ran 57.35 at the Blue and Gold Invitational at Notre Dame’s Loftus Center in South Bend, Ind, finishing just ahead of Notre Dame senior Kaitlin Ryan, who was second in 58.58.

Pope is coming off an outdoor season in which she ran a personal-best 54.93. She ran on DePaul’s winning 4-by-4 team last winter at the Big East Championsips in Chicago.

At Pennsauken, Pope ran slightly faster indoors, with a 56.98 to win the state Group 3 title at the Bubble in Toms River.

Rancocas Valley graduate Ian Moore, in his first race in 19 months, won the 1,000 Saturday at the Rutgers Holiday Classic at the Armory.

Moore, a junior at Monmouth, ran 2:29.11, edging Columbia’s Jacob Van Orden, who ran 2:29.44. Cherokee grad Nico Grilli, a freshman in his first collegiate race on the track, was 3rd in 2:30.55.

Moore did not compete last year and hadn’t raced since May 8, 2021, when he ran 1:54.12 in the 800 at the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference Championships at Rider in Lawrenceville.

Moore ran 1:51.98 earlier in the spring of 2021, which ranks No. 10 in Monmouth outdoor history. He also ranks No. 6 in the 600 (1:22.09), No. 9 in the indoor 800 (1:52.76) and No. 6 in the 1,000 (2:26.29). He was the MAAC indoor 800 champ in February of 2020.

It was Grilli’s first track race since he ran a PR 4:19.51 at the 2021 Meet of Champions in South Plainfield and his first indoor race since February of 2019.

In his first college race, Greg Foster ran the 9th-fastest 60-meter hurdles time in Princeton history.

Foster, a Lumberton native who graduated from Lawrenceville Prep, opened his collegiate career by winning the hurdles in 8.06 at the The College of New Jersey Indoor Opener Saturday at the Armory.

Foster was a five-time national scholastic champion in the horizontal jumps at Lawrenceville, but he didn’t jump Saturday, opting to focus only on the hurdles, his 3rd event in high school.

But he ran 8.20 in the prelims in his first race ever over the 42-inch hurdles and led all qualifiers into the final, where he edged sophomore teammate Philip Kastner as part of a 1-2-3-4-5 Princeton sweep. Kastner was 2nd in a PR 8.10.

Here’s a look at the all-time Princeton top-10:

7.76 … Christian Brown [2022]
7.77 … Joey Daniels [2020]
7.91 … Rob Mohr [2013]
7.95 … Greg Caldwell [2016]
7.96 … Ray Lenihan [2006]
7.98 … Adrian Mullings [2003]
8.02 … Jovan Aigbekaen [2022]
8.05 … Chris Vasich [2009]
8.06 … Greg Foster [2023]
8.08 … Taraje Whitfield [2022]

The only other South Jersey athletes I see on the Princeton men’s indoor all-time top 10 are Bridgeton’s Royce Reed No. 7 in 300 at 34.74 in 1995], West Deptford’s Cameron Atkinson [8th in 200 at 21.63 in 2002 and 6.38 in 55 in 2001]

Terrific collegiate debut for Kingsways’ Evan Corcoran, who not only ran a hot  200 but ran a leg on a fast early 4-by-4 for Rowan at the Fastrack Season Opener at Ocean Breeze.

Corcoran, who ran 10.55 and 21.62 last spring and was the state Group 4 champ in both sprints, won the 200 in 21.73 – a massive indoor PR – and ran second leg on Rowan’s 3:16.82 relay team, which won by more than five seconds.

Corcoran won the 200 by a whopping 39-100ths of a second over Cameron Summers of Stevenson of Owings Mills, Md. His time is fastest by a D-3 freshman since NCAA Division 3 champ Kai Cole (who’s now at Norfolk State) of Wesley College in Dover, Del. (now part of Delaware State) ran 21.40 at Boston University in 2019.

Corcoran has run a bit faster outdoors, but this was his by far his fastest indoor time ever. Corcoran’s high school indoor PR was 22.28 from the prelims of the Emerging Elite event at the Nike Indoor Nationals at Ocean Breeze this past March.

His time is fastest indoors by a Rowan sprinter in at least 10 years and only 17-100ths of a second off the school record of 21.56 set by Rich Dixon at the 1999 New Jersey Athletic Conference Championships, which were most likely also at the Armory.

On the 4-by-4, Nana Agyemang led off with a 48.70 split, Corcoran split 48.47, Sterling’s Jah’mere Beasley split 49.51 and Amara Conte anchored in 50.14. Rowan won by more than five seconds over St. Joe’s, which was second in 3:21.97.

Rowan won the NCAA Division 3 title in the 4-by-4 last winter with a 3:16.56 after setting a school record of 3:12.80 with Agyemang, Beasley and Conte joined by Charlie Serrano-Juarez.

Woodrow Wilson’s Dennisha Page got her 2022-23 indoor season off to a hot start by nearly toppling the Rutgers school record at 300 meters.

Page won the 300 at the Rutgers Holiday Classic at the 168th Street Armory in 39.32, only 12-100ths of a second off the school record of 39.25 set by Bria Saunders of Parsippany High at the Beantown Challenge on Harvard’s track in Cambridge, Mass., in 2017.

This was Page’s first lifetime 300 in her three indoor seasons – one at Syracuse and two at Rutgers. She ran one as a senior at Wilson on the same Armory track in 41.80 back in December of 2018.

Page ran 11.39 and 23.55 last spring for Rutgers.

Page won the race by a whopping .68-100ths of a second over Amara Onyeuku of Columbia, who ran 40.00. She also ran a leadoff 59.7 leg on Rutgers’ 4-by-400 team, which placed 4th in 4:00.62.

In her first race for Holy Family College, former Lenape star Jasmine Staten destroyed the school record in the 60-meter hurdles.

Staten, who competed for Bloomfield last year, ran a personal-best 8.36 in the trials of the Fastrack Season Opener at Ocean Breeze in Staten Island Friday, then won the final in 8.68. Julia Kirschnick of Georgian Court in Lakewood led all qualifiers in 7.90 but didn’t contest the final.

Staten shattered the Holy Family record of 9.00 set by Lindzey Mosley at the 2019 East Coast Conference Championships, also at Ocean Breeze.

Her previous PR was 8.78 for Bloomfield from the West Point (N.Y.) Tune-Up at Army-Gillis Fieldhouse this past February.

Staten won the final over Aisha Carrington of Lincoln (Pa.), who ran 9.01, and Rancocas Valley grad Anabella Chin of St. Joe’s, who was 3rd in 9.12 in her first college race. Another South Jersey freshman, Gloria Hughes of Willingboro and Rowan, was 4th in 9.31 in her first college race.

Staten also placed 3rd in the 200 in 26.01 in what appears to be her first indoor 200 since she ran 25.54 as a Lenape junior at the 2016 Varsity Classic at the Armory.

After sitting out the 2019, 2020 and 2021 outdoor seasons, Staten won the Central Atlantic Athletic Conference 100-meter hurdles title in May in Lakewood and finished the year ranked 9th in NCAA Division 2 at 13.74. She qualified for the NCAA Division 2 Championships but did not compete.

Staten is listed as a sophomore bio-chemistry major at Holy Family, located in the Torresdale section of Philadelphia, about 600 yards from the Bucks County border.