The results from this weekend’s GLIAC conference home meet are in, and 13 Hillsdale athletes have qualified for the NCAA Division II Indoor National Championships on March 14-15. The men’s team will send seven, and the women’s squad six. The women’s team is currently ranked 13th among the nation’s Division II teams.
Continuing its success from the last several meets, especially in the distance and relay events, the women’s track team took 4th place and the men’s team took 6th in the GLIAC conference meet.
“The meet this week went really well,” junior Heather Lantis said. “We placed 4th, which is much better than we did last year, and the GLIAC is known across the country to be really competitive, so it was great that we did so well against other really competitive schools.”
For the women’s team, sophomore Emily Oren took 1st place in the mile run, clocking an NCAA provisional time with a last-minute surge and pass that launched her to qualifying for nationals. Similarly, junior Amy Kerst took 1st in the 800-meter run, setting a new Margot V. Biermann Center record and qualifying her for nationals. Freshman Allison Duber won 2nd place in the 400-meter dash in an extremely close top-three finish.
For the second year in a row, the women’s 4×400 took the conference championship. Duber, along with freshman Danielle Gagne and sophomores Emily Guy and Corinne Zehner, also set a new Biermann record.
“I think this year was definitely more successful. We scored a lot more points as a team and a lot more people ended up on the podium, that is, places one through three,” senior Chelsea Kilgore said. “A few years ago we had maybe one person on the podium. This year we have multiple people winning the races.”
For the men’s team, junior Joshua Mirth took his second GLIAC championship this year in the 5000-meter run, and placed 5th in the 3000-meter shortly afterward. Senior Maurice Jones took 6th in the 200-meter dash, and the 4×400 meter relay team, composed of freshman Ty Etchemendy, seniors Matthew Raffin, Jared Van Dyke, and Jones, placed 5th, and will continue on to the national championships.
Etchemendy also placed 3rd in the triple jump, and senior John Banovetz took 5th in the shot put with a personal record-breaking toss. He will also be going to the championships.
In addition to those mentioned above, women’s team members freshmen Alex Whitford, Jessica Hurley, and sophomores Kate Royer and Kristina Galat, and senior Elliot Murphy on the men’s team, will represent Hillsdale College at nationals.
The teams also noted the impact of the home meet and the supporting crowd for the teams’ successes.
“It’s so amazing having such a huge, supporting crowd,” Kilgore said. “Every time I came around a corner there was a roar of support, and every time I began to lag I could hear people around who were depending on me and I would speed right back up.”