Hammonton grad Alexa Gardner PR’d in the javelin Friday in the Big Ten Conference meet in Minneapolis.

Gardner, a junior at Rutgers, placed 4th with a throw of 157-9. That eclipsed her PR of 155-6, which she threw at the Larry Ellis Invitational in Princeton last month as well as at the Penn Relays.

Gardner actually had two throws beyond her previous PR. She followed the 157-9 with a 156-1 and also had a throw of 152-4.

At Hammonton, Gardner had a PR of 142-1 when she won the state Group 3 meet at Northern Burlington in June of 2017.

Delsea graduate Elisia Lancaster bombed a hammer PR Friday and won at the Missouri Valley Conference Championships.

Lancaster threw 220-4 on her fourth attempt at Drake Stadium in Des Moines, Iowa, to pass teammate and defending champion Shauniece O’Neal, who was in the lead with a 219-4 on her first attempt.

That’s No. 17 among all U.S. women this year and moves her up to No. 58 in U.S. history, one spot behind another Delsea graduate, Jamine Moton, who threw 220-6 in Baton Rouge in 2002.

It’s also No. 14 in NCAA Division 1 this year.

Next up for Lancaster is the NCAA East Region Preliminary at Robert C. Haugh Track and Field Complex at the University of Indiana in Bloomington, Ind., May 25-28. The top performers there advance to the NCAA Championships at Hayward Field in Eugene, Ore., June 8-11.

Lancaster’s previous PR was a throw of 219-9 last month at the Joey Haines Invitational at Cape Girardeau, Mo.

Last year, Lancaster placed fifth in the conference meet with a throw of 194-2. She had a PR of 207-11 coming into this season but increased it to 208-5 at a meet in Murray, Ky., in March and then 218-9 at the Joey Haynes meet. Since then she has thrown 210-7, 214-6 and 215-11 in her last three meets.

Lancaster opened Friday with a 200-10 followed by a 212-3. After fouling on her third attempt, she hit the winner on her first attempt of the finals. She fouled on No. 5 and 6, but O’Neal fouled on her last four throws and settled for second place, exactly a foot behind her teammate.

Interesting and very fast 800 in Wednesday’s Eastern-Cherry Hill East girls dual meet in Voorhees.

Eastern junior Kadence Dumas, in her first major 800 this year, edged Cherry Hill East’s Alexis Tepper, Dumas running 2:19.4 and Tepper 2:21.0.

You rarely get hot times in dual meets, but when conditions are good and two talented runners find themselves in the same race it can happen.

According to her MileSplit page, Dumas hadn’t run an 800 since a PR 2:32.14 at last year’s South Jersey Group 4 sectionals at Washington Township. She did run 58.08 at the South Jersey Elite, placing second to Timber Creek’s Chloe Jones, who ran 57.68. Those times rank Jones and White No. 3 and 4 in South Jersey this year.

Tepper, also a junior, ran 2:19.12 indoors at the Bubble, but the 2:21.0 is an outdoor personal best.

Although dual meet times aren’t considered for list purposes, Dumas would rank No. 3 in South Jersey this year and Tepper would be No. 5.

Promising performances from two of South Jersey’s best middle-distance runners. Certainly will make for a loaded 800 at the Olympic Conference meet, which will presumably include three of the Cherokee girls – Cherokee has the four-fastest half-milers in South Jersey so far this year – as well as White and Tepper.

The Olympic Conference Championships are scheduled for May 24 at Washington Township.

Eastern grad Jewel Ash, a sophomore at Charleston Southern, won her second straight Big South Conference 400-meter intermediate hurdles title and broke the 58-second barrier for the third straight time.

Ash, who ran a personal-best and meet-record 57.16 in the trials on Monday, won the final in 57.92 at High Point, N.C. She won by nearly a second over Dejah Grant of Hampton, who was second in 58.89.

She ranks No. 7 in the NCAA East Region, No. 13 in Division 1, No. 17 among U.S. women and No. 46 in the world.

Ash won the 400IH at last year’s Big South Championships in 1:00.51 after a 59.50 in the trials that was her first race under a minute. She broke 59 for the first time with a 58.83 last month in Greensboro, N.C.

Next for Ash is the NCAA East Preliminary at the Robert Haugh Track and Field Complex at the University of Indiana in Bloomington, May 25-28. The NCAA Championships are scheduled for June 8-11 at Hayward Field in Eugene, Ore.

Penns Grove senior Bailey Ricks ran a huge PR of 12.48 to win the 100 at the Salem County Championships Wednesday at Pennsville. She came back to win the 200 as well.

Ricks’ 100 time is No. 5 in South Jersey this year and No. 10 in the state. It’s also fastest by a Salem County girl since 2015, when Penns Grove’s Jocelyn Brown ran 12.42 at the Meet of Champions after placing 2nd at states.

According to her MileSplit page, this was Ricks’ first major outdoor race this year and her first race since the indoor Meet of Champions. She ran 7.63 and placed third in the Group 1 state meet indoors at the Bubble. Her outdoor big-meet 100 PR seems to be a 14.26 from last year’s Group 1 sectionals at Washington Township.

The 12.48 is 2nd-fastest this year in the state by a Group 1 runner. Clayton’s Arianna Sharpe ran 12.35 at Delsea last week.

Ricks won the 200 in 26.42. Her MileSplit page shows no previous 200s in a major meet. She also won the triple jump at 34-3 in what appears to be her first lifetime triple jump competition. That’s No. 10 in South Jersey this year and No. 2 in New Jersey Group 1.

Salem won the team title 107-97 over Pennsville.

Millville senior Leah Ellis recorded her second straight quad win Tuesday at the Cumberland County Championships.

Ellis won the 100-meter hurdles as well as the high jump, long jump and triple jump to help Millville win its 10th straight county title.

Ellis won the hurdles in 15.46, the high jump at 4-10, the long jump with a 17-7 ¾ and the triple jump at 35-3 ¼ at Cumberland Regional in Upper Deerfield.

Ellis ranks No. 1 in the long jump at 17-11 from Woodbury, No. 2 in in the hurdles at 15.15 from South Jersey Elite, No. 5 in the triple jump with a 36-3 ½ from Woodbury, and No. 12 in the high jump with her 4-10 on Tuesday in her first high jump competition in nearly a year.

Millville has won every Cumberland County meet since 2012. There was no meet in 2020. Last time Millville didn’t win was 2011, when Bridgeton outscored Vineland 167-72 to win the team title, with Millville third with 50 ½ points.

Those 10 team titles have been by an average of 77.3 points, ranging from 18 in 2016 to 184 in 2019. Vineland has been second seven of the last nine meets.

2022 Millville 154, Vineland 112
2021 Millville 172, Cumberland Regioanal 51
2020 cancelled
2019 Millville 238, Vineland 54
2018 Millville 187, Vineland 88
2017 Millville 112, Vineland 90 ½
2016 Millville 90 ½, Cumberland Regional 72 ½
2015 Millville 109, Vineland 71
2014 Millville 125, Vineland 51
2013 Millville 141, Vineland 55 ½
2012 Millville 135, Bridgeton 46 \
2011 Bridgeton 167, Vineland 72, Millville 50 ½

Shawnee grad Amanda Demko, a sophomore at The College of New Jersey, won her third straight NJAC 400-meter dash championship on Monday.

Demko ran a personal-best 56.15 to win the 400 at the New Jersey Athletic Conference championships on her home track in Ewing.

She was only 21-100ths of a second off the meet record of 55.94 set 39 years ago by Natalie Jordan of William Paterson in the 1983 meet at Glassboro State. Jordan went on to win the 400 at the NCAA Division 3 Championships in Naperville, Ill., with a meet-record 54.73.

Demko is now 3-for-3 in the 400 at the NJAC championships. She won the outdoor title last spring in 57.91 and the indoor title in 57.68.

Her time Monday ranks No. 5 in TCNJ history. She’s No. 8 indoors after just one season. She’s also No. 11 nationally in NCAA Division 3, which should qualify her for the Division 3 Nationals .

Demko also ran the second leg on TCNJ’s winning 400-meter relay team. Ashlyn MacLure of Nashoba Regional High in Bolton, Mass., led off, Demko ran the second leg and Maria Grill of Whippanny Park and Valandra Riggins of Lawrence finished up. The Lions ran 47.13, beating Ramapo by 3-100ths of a second. That’s No. 7 in NCAA Division 3 and a qualifier for nationals.

Demko didn’t run on TCNJ’s 4-by-4 Monday but did run on their fastest team this year along with Ocean City graduate Erin Hanlon, Allishon Uhl of Park Ridge and Riggins. That group ran 3:50.02 at Widener University in Chester, Pa., last month, which ranks 9th in Division 3. Hanlon, Uhl and Erin Buquicchio of Pascack Hills ran on that team, which will also run at Nationals.

She also PR’d in the 200 with a 25.29 in the trials and placed fifth in the final.

Woodstown grad Molly Lodge, a Rowan freshman, PR’d in both of those races with a 25.10 in the 200 trials and 56.88 in the 400. She placed 4th in both races.

Demko’s fastest high school 400 was a 58.54 at the 2020 indoor Meet of Champions at the Bubble. And she ran 58.66 outdoors two months later at Group 4 sectionals at Washington Township.

She lowered her PR to 57.46 last April in a meet at Franklin Field and ran an indoor PR of 57.68 at last year’s NJAC meet at Ocean Breeze. She dipped under 57 for the first time last month with a 56.99 in a meet at Stockton University in Galloway Township, PR’d again last month with a 56.92 in Princeton and then recorded her third PR in three major outdoor meets on Monday.

TCNJ outscored 2nd-place Rowan 245-192 to win its third straight team title and 30th since 1986, the first 10 as Trenton State College.

Division 3 nationals are scheduled for May 26-28 at SPIRE Institute in Geneva, Ohio.

Rowan’s John Owens, Treshan Stevenson, Marquise Young and Joe DeVito swept the top four spots in the 400-meter hurdles Monday on Day 2 of the NJAC Championships in Ewing.

Owens, a senior from West Windsor-Plainsboro North, won the race with a personal-best 52.98; Stevenson, a freshman from Millville, was 2nd with a PR 53.24; Young, a junior from Sterling, placed 3rd with a PR 54.16; and DeVito, a junior from Jackson Liberty, took 4th with a near-PR of 54.19.

That’s 29 of a possible 39 points in the intermediates on the Profs’ way to their 7th straight New Jersey Athletic Conference team title.

Those four now rank No. 7, 10, 28 and 29 in all of NCAA Division 3 for top-ranked Rowan.

Owens’ previous PR was a 53.50 just two weeks ago on the same track. Stevenson lowered his PR from 53.94 in the same meet as Owens. Young shaved nearly 2 ½ seconds off his previous PR of 57.23 from Baltimore last month. And DeVito ran just 5-100ths of a second off his PR of 54.14 from last year’s NJAC meet.

Owens, Young and Stevenson also ran on Rowan’s winning 1,600-meter relay team, which ran 3:15.30. They were joined by Washington Township’s Jake Kolodziej, who also won the 800.

Young also won the 110-meter highs with a personal-best 14.57, which is No. 21 in Division 3.

His previous PR was 14.70 in Auburn last month. He’s run more than half a second over the 42-inch hurdles in college than he ran over the 39-inch barriers in high school, where he had a 15.10 PR.

Eastern graduate Jewel Ash, a sophomore at Charleston Southern, ran another 400-meter intermediate hurdles PR Monday and broke the meet record at the Big South Conference Championships.

Ash ran 57.16 in the trials at Vert Stadium at High Point (N.C.) University, shattering the meet record of 57.86 set in 2013 by Jessica Gelibert of Coastal Carolina in Lynchburg, Va.

Her time is No. 13 in NCAA Division 1 this year and No. 17 among U.S. women . It’s also 7th-fastest ever by a woman from New Jersey (see list below).

Ash lowered her PR and school record from 57.43, which she ran last month in Columbia, S.C.

Ash ran 59.50 as a freshman and won the Big South title with a 1:00.51.

This spring, she dipped under 60 seconds for the first time at the Raleigh Relays in March, then lowered her best time to 58.83 at the Aggie Invitational in Greensboro in early April and then to 57.43 in Columbia.

In Mondays trials, the only other hurdlers under 60 seconds were Campbell sophomore Chastity Pickett, who ran 58.73, and Howard sophomore Dejah Grant, who ran 59.82 to win the first of two semis.

The final is scheduled for 6:05 p.m. on Wednesday.

Ash’s time is less than half a second off the standard to qualify for the U.S. Olympic Track and Field Trials scheduled for June 23-26 at Hayward Field in Eugene, Ore.

Here’s a look at the fastest intermediate hurdlers in history hailing from New Jersey:

52.23 … Sydney McLaughlin [Union Catholic], Oct. 4, 2019, Doha, Qatar
55.78 … Tonya Lee [Rancocas Valley], April 21, 1996, Walnut, Calif.
56.21 … Krystal Cantey [Winslow Twp.], May 26, 2007, Gainesville, Fla.
56.87 … Evann Thompson [Lenape], May 30, 2014, Jacksonville, Fla.
56.91 … Angela Lee [Franklin Twp.], May 24, 1998, Fairfax, Va.
57.14 … Leslie Njoku [McNair Academic], June 8, 2011, Des Moines, Iowa
57.16 … Jewel Ash [Eastern], May 9, 2022, High Point, N.C.
58.38 … Ste’yce McNeil [Winslow], May 2, 2015, Starkville, Miss.

Rowan junior Jake Kolodziej from Washington Township won his first conference title Monday, and freshman teammate Tyler Greene placed 4th in the 800 with a PR.

Kolodziej ran 1:55.34 to win the New Jersey Athletic Conference 800 at The College of New Jersey in Ewing, and Greene ran 1:56.97.

Kolodziej was out in 57.41 and closed in 57.94 to overtake Ramapo freshman Matthew Cortez, who led with a lap to go.

Greene, racing in an unseeded heat, lowered his PR from 1:57.95, which he just ran two weeks ago on the same track. He came into the meet ranked 17th in the 800 in the NJAC and seeded 12th.