WEEKEND ROUNDUP: Central Washington earns seventeen wins at their own Wildcat Invite...
ELLENSBURG, Washington--The Great Northwest Athletic Conference championships returns to Ellensburg in three weeks to the Central Washington University Recreation Sports Complex, so all four Washington Division II schools used Saturday's Wildcat Invitational as a measuring stick to see how they stack against each other as well as against other athletes in the conference.
Besides the host Wildcats and the three other Washington GNAC schools, Western Oregon, Alaska Anchorage, Northwest Nazarene, and MSU-Billings sent a contingent of athletes to Ellensburg to check out the venue where the conference championship meet will occur.
The host Wildcats picked up eight wins on the women's side and nine on the men's side, while Western Washington had six men's winners and four women's winners.
Saint Martin's earned three wins on the day, while Seattle Pacific had their lone victory in the women's 1500.
The best marks of the day came from Central Washington freshman pole vaulter Lauryn McGough (photo courtesy CWU Athletics), along with her sophomore teammate, 400 meter hurdler Ellie DeGroot.
McGough started slowly, but needed a third attempt clearance at 12-1.5 (3.70m) just to stay alive in the competition, with Seattle Pacific's Emily Thomason and Lizzy Daugherty, the two remaining vaulters in the competition having cleared that bar.
The Seattle Pacific duo were eliminated at the next height of 12-7.5 (3.85m) as McGough navigated the bar on her second attempt, then made 12-11.75 (3.96m) before clearing 13-1.75 (4.01m).
That mark is currently the tenth best mark in Division II this season.
Ellie DeGroot, the defending indoor pentathlon champ and conference leader in the 400 hurdles as well as the outdoor heptathlon, won convincingly in a time of 60.89 to extend her lead in the GNAC standings.
The mark stands number 12 on the NCAA D2 descending order list after this weekend's meets.
Earlier in the meet, she was second in the 100 hurdles to teammate and NCAA indoor qualifier Lauryn Chandler. Chandler ran 13.99 to DeGroot's 14.08.
Western Washington's Jakob Braunstein put himself in position to qualify for the NCAA championships at the end of May, as he threw 203-0 (61.88m) to win the javelin.
Other GNAC conference leading marks were put up by Central Washington E'lexis Hollis in the 200 (24.16); Aiden Wise in the 110 hurdles (14.54); Josh Boast in the men's 400 hurdles (53.71), both men's and women's 4 x 100 relay teams (41.01 and 46.23); the men's 4 x 400 relay (3:19.69); and, Drew Klein in the pole vault (15-7.25/4.76m)
NOTE: The sports information office of Central Washington University, Western Washington University, and Seattle Pacific University contributed to this report.
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