(Columbia, SC) - The Women's team had 12 Cardinals make the trip down to Columbia International University for the NCCAA National Championships on Thursday, May 11 through Friday, May 12. The team came away with 4 personal bests, 2 school records and 2 National Champions.
The Women's team earned a 9th-place finish with a total of 29 points, finishing just 4 points behind Roberts Wesleyan and 3 points ahead of Geneva. The majority of points were provided by sophomores Lena Korte (Clinton, MI) and Julia Hirt (Hartland, WI), who each won an individual national championship in their event. Korte won Shot Put with a distance of 13.68 meters. Hirt won Discus with a throw of 43.47 meters and earning an National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA) qualifying mark.
Freshman Morgan Jenkins (Cleveland, OH) and Korte also competed in Hammer Throw. Jenkins led the two ladies with a 10th-place finish with a throw of 40.34 meters. Korte finished in 19th place with a throw of 36.68 meters. Korte completed the trifecta by also competing in Javelin. She finished just shy of a points position with a 9th place finish a throw of 31.11 meters.
Senior Emily Belinsky (Beluah, MI) had an impressive final meet of her career, as she took on 5 events throughout the two-day event. Her weekend started with 100 hurdle primaries, where she finished in 10th place and ran a new personal record time of 16.10. She then competed in the 200 preliminaries later in the evening, where she ran another personal record time of 26.79 seconds for 22nd place.
Belinsky's second day started with the 4x100 relay, where she was joined by Hope Renfer (Northville, MI), Lilly Kueber (Junior, Northville, MI), and Chloe Evans (Freshman; New Boston, MI) to earn a 9th-place finish with a time of 51.98 seconds. She then competed in the 400-meter hurdles, where she barely clipped the school record with a time of 1:08.10 and just missed a top-3 finish and had to settle for 4th place. Belinsky finished her weekend by teaming up with Renfer, Evans, and Chloe Gunter (Sophomore; Monroe, MI) in the 4x400 to end the running events on the weekend. The Women ran a time of 4:24.22 for 7th place.
Gunter also competed in the 4x800 on Thursday with Amanda Fogo (Freshman; Fowlerville, MI), Alison Doerr (Freshman; Grand Haven, MI), and Mary Salem (Junior; Troy, MI). The relay team finished in 7th place with a time of 11:18.89.
The team saw two athletes' time in the program come to an end, as both Belinsky and Renfer will move on from the program after a couple of very solid seasons for both of them. The team will also lose Alyvia Hock and Sierra Stetchebar to graduation.
While most of the team has had their season has came to an end, Korte and Hirt will prepare to compete at the NAIA Nationals at Indiana Wesleyan on Thursday, May 25, and Friday, May 26.
