Lenape graduate Shelby Whetstone, a Rutgers senior, smashed her 800 PR Friday at the Virginia Challenge.

Whetstone ran 2:07.91 and won the 1st of three 800 sections. Her previous PR was a 2:08.02 in a meet at Palo Alto, Calif., in March of 2022, but she ran sub-2:09 in each of her first two races this spring – 2:08.66 in Raleigh last month and 2:08.99 in Gainesville last weekend, setting her up for a PR performance in Charlottesville.

Her time is No. 6 in Rutgers history and 10th-fastest (as far as I can find) by a South Jersey alum. She’s 3rd-fastest by a Burlington County half-miler, behind Rancocas Valley’s Kimarra McDonald [2:02.20 in 2012] and Shawnee’s Kristen Neidrach [2:07.18 in 2021].

All-Time South Jersey 800 Alumni List
1:59.99 … Erin Donohue [Haddonfield], July 13, 2010, Liège, Belgium
2:02.20 … Kimarra McDonald [Rancocas Valley], June 2, 2012, Nashville
2:02.49 … Krista Ferrara [Vineland], June 25, 2006, Indianapolis
2:03.34 … Greta Feldman [Haddonfield], June 15, 2013, Indianapolis
2:03.88 … Nijgia Snapp [Oakcrest], May 13, 2012, Baton Rouge, La.
2:05.06 … Renee Tomlin [Ocean City], May 31, 2013, West Chester, Pa.
2:06.15 … Sydney Coppolino [Sterling], May 13, 2022, Durham, N.C.
2:07.18 … Kristen Neidrach [Shawnee], Kortrijk, Belgium, July 10, 2021
2:07.25 … Marielle Hall [Haddonfield], March 26, 2011, Houston
2:08.02 … Shelby Whetstone [Lenape], April 2, 2022, Palo Alto, Calif.
2:08.15 … Kami Joi Hickson [Washington Twp.], April 13, Azusa, Calif.
2:08.36 … Sarah Robbie [Cherokee], May 13, 2017, University Park, Pa.

It was a frustrating Day of the NCAA Championships for Cherokee’s Lucciano Pizarro and Cinnaminson’s Austin Gabay, who both missed advancing by the smallest of margins.

But both concluded breakthrough sophomore seasons, Pizarro for Penn State and Gabay for Duke.

Pizarro was sitting in the 12th and final qualifying spot to advance to the shot put semifinals at the NCAA Championships in Austin next month with only one thrower remaining who could knock him out of the last spot – Isaiah Rogers of Kenesaw (Ga.) State. Pizarro had thrown 61-2, 61-4 ¼ and 61-3 in a very consistent series, but Rogers bumped him with a 61-6 ¼ on his 3rd and final attempt to earn the last qualifying spot.

Pizarro ranks 19th among U.S. men with his 65-0 ¾ at the Big Ten Championships earlier this month in Bloomington, Ind., and No. 4 in Penn State history.

Gabay, who qualified for NCAAs with a 3:42.94 in Winston-Salem, N.C., last month, had the misfortune of competing in the 4th and final heat of the 1,500 trials, which produced seven of the eight-fastest times of all four races. So even though he had the 16th-fastest time and 24 runners advance to Friday’s quarterfinals, he didn’t advance because he had the 5th-fastest time outside the five auto qualifiers per heat, and only those 20 auto-qualifiers and the next four-fastest advance.

If he ran 3:46.07 in the 1st or 3rd qualifying heat, he would have advanced. Gabay actually ran faster than nine auto-qualifiers. He missed snagging the final small-Q qualifier by 11-100ths of a second.

In the long jump, none of the three South Jersey qualifiers advanced. Princeton freshman Greg Foster from Lumberton only managed one legal attempted and jumped 23-6 ¾, Rutgers junior Jabari Higgs-Salaam of Haddon Heights jumped 23-4 ¼ and Rider junior Zach Manorowitz of Pennsville didn’t get a legal mark.

Foster jumped 26-1 ¾ this year, Manorowitz went 25-0 ¾ and Higgs-Salaam hit 24-11 ¾ and has a wind-legal PR of 24-0 ¾.

Foster will be back in action Friday in the triple jump at 6 p.m.

South Jersey’s one qualifier from Wednesday’s first round is St. Augustine’s Sincere Rhea, who advanced in the 110-meter hurdles. Details here.

The women’s East and West prelims begin on Thursday. Click here for details on all of South Jersey’s NCAA Division 1 qualifiers.

Winslow graduate Cidaea’ Woods, now a Tennessee sophomore, posted a long jump PR of 21-0 at the SEC Meet earlier this month in Columbia, S.C., earning her a berth in the NCAA Eastern Regional prelims this week in Lexington, Ky.

Woods improved her PR from 20-11 3/4 from last years SEC meet to 21-0 at this year’s meet.

Her mark is No. 24 in all of NCAA Division 1 and No. 13 in the East Regional. She’ll compete in the third of four flights starting at 7:15 p.m. on Friday. The top 12 advance to nationals in Eugene.

At Winslow, Woods had a PR of 19-9 1/4 from states her junior year, so she’s already added more than a foot to that.

Woods is ranked No. 24 among all U.S. women and No. 60 in the world.

 

Jessica Woodard couldn’t have picked a better time to turn in the best performance of her life.

Woodard, a 2013 Cherokee High graduate and currently a freshman at Oklahoma, threw the discus a personal-best 176-8 to place 11th at NCAA West Regionals and qualify for the NCAA Championships.

Woodard was seeded 28th with her previous PR of 173-0, set at the Rafer Johnson-Jackie Joyner Kersee Invitational last month at UCLA.

The top 12 finishers from each of two regional meets this weekend advanced to the NCAA Championships June 10-13 at Hayward Field in Eugene, Ore.

Woodard was sitting in 16th place after throwing 167-9 on her first attempt and was in 21st place after fouling on her second throw. But she powered her way into the top 12 on her third and final attempt.

She wound up qualifying by eight inches.

Woodard is now the No. 5-ranked freshman in NCAA Division 1, behind Katelyn Daniels of Michigan State (193-9), Maggie Ewen of Arizona State (186-8), Josie Natrasevschi of Brown (183-9) and Agnes Esser of Minnesota (178-5).

One other record Woodard broke Friday has stood for more than 26 years. That’s the Burlington County alumni record in the women’s discus.

On May 6, 1989, Pemberton graduate Lillian Rivera, competing for Texas Southern in the Southwestern Conference championships in Houston, threw 174-6. That stood as the best throw ever by a Burlington County native.

Until now.

Jess Woodard has a new discus PR on her resume. The 2013 Cherokee High graduate, now a freshman at Oklahoma, threw 173-0 at the Rafer Johnson-Jackie Joyner Kersee Invitational Saturday at UCLA.

Woodard’s previous PR was 168-10, when she was fourth at the USATF Junior National Championships in Des Moines, Iowa, in June 2013.

Woodard was competing against an international field of throwers. She was sixth overall but first among collegians.

Her series looked like this: Foul … 161-11 1/4 … 163-8 1/2 … 173-0 … Foul … Foul.

Woodard, a shot and discus Meet of Champions winner at Cherokee, is now the No. 5 freshman collegian in the country and ranked 29th overall in NCAA Division 1.

The University of Oklahoma doesn’t have a current track and field media guide on its web site. In fact, the most recent one is from 2010. But we took the all-time Sooners women’s discus list from 2009 and updated it, and it looks like Jess is already No. 4 in school history in the discus!

• 186-1 … Brittany Borman (2010)
• 182-9 … Karen Shump (2010)
• 180-6 … Bambi Carson (2001)
• 173-0 … Jess Woodard (2015)
• 173-0 … Bailey Wagner (2012)
• 173-6 … Alexandra Morgan (2014)
• 167-1 … Jessica Longfors (2001)
• 166-1 … Kelsey Poljansek (2011)
• 164-7 … Jorunn Tangen (1983)
• 170-2 … Kate Foster (2015)
• 161-10 … Lauren Guerreri (2012)

Woodard is also closing in on the Burlington County alumni discus record set on May 6, 1989, by Pemberton graduate Lillian Rivera. She was competing for Texas Southern when she  threw 174-6 at the 1989 SEC meet in Houston.

Woodard also placed fourth in the hammer throw with a 175-5.

Full results of the meet are here: http://www.soonersports.com/pdf9/3423010.pdf