Seattle Pacific's Vanessa Aniteye wins NCAA 800m title in Virginia Beach...

VIRGINIA BEACH, Virginia--Seattle Pacific senior Vanessa Aniteye (Chris Reed/SPU Athletics photo) went from being out of the sport nearly three years ago after the birth of her child to a national champion Saturday, winning the women’s 800 meters on the final day of the NCAA Division II indoor championships at the Virginia Beach Sports Center.

Aniteye surged over the final 200 meters of the race to claim the championship with a lifetime best time of 2:06.84. She was two-tenths of a second ahead of CSU Pueblo’s Helen Braybook, who ran the fastest time in the preliminaries.

The victory put Aniteye number 5 on the GNAC all-time list. She is the 17th indoor Division II champion in GNAC history and the first for Seattle Pacific since Jessica Pixler and the Falcons’ women’s distance medley relay team in 2010.

Her mark was fast enough to break the school indoor record. The previous mark of 2:07.52 was set by Lynelle Decker in a second-place finish at the 2016 NCAAs.

"I think all the competitors came to race, and it showed early on," Aniteye said. "I took out the first 200 hot like I planned to, and I think all of the others were like, 'Hey, we're also here to win it.'

 

"The field made me race," she added. "It felt great after leading D2 all season to be able to prove that I didn't just do that all by myself. I could also do it while competing with the best in the nation, and that was amazing. I couldn't think of a better way to end the season."

 

Complete results of the NCAA Division II indoor championships are available here.

OUTDOOR NOTES...

At the PLU Invitational Saturday in Tacoma, the Western Washington University Track & Field team continued its early outdoor schedule recording 13 event wins.

Saint Martin's earned four victories on the day.

Complete results of the PLU Invitational are available here.

All four Washington GNAC schools will be in action on Saturday March 18th at the Doris Heritage Track Festival at Renton Stadium, hosted by Seattle Pacific.

NOTE: The NCAA, and the sports information office of Seattle Pacific University and the Great Northwest Athletic Conference contributed to this report.

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