On April 11, Elizabethtown College went to Grantham, Pennsylvania to take part in the Falcon Multi and Invitational hosted by Messiah College. Last season, the women’s team finished third out of 16 teams and the men’s team finished seventh of the 17 teams, both hoping to finish just as strong in their 2025 outdoor track and field campaign.
In the 100-meter dash, first-year Liliana Zimmerman did well in the preliminaries, finishing with a time of 13.44. However, it was just below the cutoff for the final as she finished 12th overall. For the men, first-year John Mullery led Etown, finishing with a time of 11.95 and placing himself 35th overall in the event. In the 200-meter dash, the Blue Jays did particularly well, with sophomores Trevor Albright and Cameron Michaels finishing third and fourth respectively. Junior Matthew Lamb finished behind the two, placing seventh overall and earning a combined 13 points in the event for Etown. The 400-meter dash was the same story for the Blue Jays, with first-year Luke Vottero finishing tenth overall in the event, less than a half of a second off of eighth place. Senior Melissa Patton for the women’s team finished well, putting together a time of 63.94 and finishing ninth overall in the 400m.
First-year Will Withall finished tenth overall in the 800-meter run, missing out on ninth by only eight-hundredths of a second. Etown had another strong performance in the 1500-meter run, with sophomore Jake Smith finishing tenth, beating his Blue Jay teammate senior Carson Wiley by one-hundredth of a second, who finished 11th. First-year Ethan Wence rounded out the top 20 positions, finishing with a time of four minutes and 18 seconds. In the 3000-meter steeplechase, Etown picked up some team points off a seventh-place finish by senior Todd Shifflett, a fourth-place finish by junior Isabell Anderson and a sixth-place finish by Maeve Keefe. The Blue Jays did well in the 400-meter hurdles, with sophomore Lucas Novack finishing second overall in the event, with a time of 57.02, only seven-thousandths off the winner, earning eight points for Etown. First-years Kirsten Navich and Jaelyn Pennypacker finished fourth and sixth overall in the 400-meter hurdles for the women, adding a combined eight points to the team score. In the 4×100 relay, Etown’s women’s A team finished fourth, the B team finished fifth and the men’s team finished fourth overall.
The Blue Jay throwers stole the show for the events, with graduate Mylea Neidig winning the women’s shot put event overall, scoring an event-high throw at 11.67 meters. First-year Isabella Cowger finished third overall, throwing for a max of 11.06 meters. Sophomore Jessica Pronchick rounded out the point-scorers for the shot put, finishing seventh and throwing a max of 10.38 meters. For the men’s team, sophomore Joseph Walko finished 11th overall, throwing a max of 12.96 meters. In the discus, Walko finished just short of the top eight, throwing a final distance of 38.62 meters and placing ninth. Cowger took home the gold for the event in the discus, throwing two meters over the second-place total with a throw distance of 41.81 meters. Senior DaniRae Renno added more points for the women’s team, throwing for 35.65 meters, combining the total in the event to 14 points for the Blue Jays. In the hammer throw, Etown finished just short of the points positions with Walko finishing 12th in the men’s division and Cowger finishing 11th in the women’s division. First-year Alexis Rich did well for the Blue Jays, putting together a seventh-place finish in the javelin with a 30-meter throw and adding two points. Senior Aspen Stahl-Emig finished 15th overall in the javelin, off of the points positions by three meters.
After all the events, the women’s team finished sixth of the 20 teams that competed this past weekend with 55 points. The men’s team finished ninth of the 26 teams in the competition with 28 points. Etown will host their Miller Sports Construction Blue Jay Tune-Up on April 25-26 to prepare for the Landmark Outdoor Championships on May 3-4.
