NEWVILLE, PA – Paced by a first-place finish by
Adriana Catalano, the Johns Hopkins women's cross country team swept the top five spots to win its 16
th consecutive Centennial Conference Championship Saturday afternoon. This is the third straight season in which the Blue Jays have had the individual winner and finished with the minimum possible 15 points — they are the only team to achieve the feat in conference championship history.
Catalano was excellent in Saturday's 6K Championship, climbing three spots between the one-mile and three-mile markers before passing a teammate in the final kilometer to cross the line in first with a time of 21:57.3. The junior was the only runner to finish with a sub-22-minute 6K, with her final time serving as the third-fastest run by a Hopkins athlete in the last three years.
Coming in behind Catalano were sisters
Carter Brotherton and
Cooper Brotherton. Carter climbed three spots to lead the race at the three-mile mark before settling into second with a final time of 22:05.3 in her first ever Centennial Conference Championship, while Cooper crossed the line just over 12 seconds later in third with a time of 22:17.2 to complete the Blue Jay podium.
Rounding out the top five and securing the sweep in the meet were
Sydney Shock and
Aisling Callahan, both of whom climbed one spot in the home stretch to lead Hopkins to its perfect 15-point score. Shock positioned herself in the top five for the entirety of the race, passing Gettysburg's Kathryn Hopkins in the final kilometer to finish fourth with a time of 22:23.6. Callahan, meanwhile, had to work her way through the field after sitting in 11
th after the opening mile, passing four competitors over the next two miles before passing Hopkins herself to finish less than a second behind Shock with a final time of 22:23.7
Despite not counting toward Hopkins' final point tally,
Jamie Stelnik impressed in Saturday's race, running the fourth-fastest final split to pass three competitors and finish seventh with a time of 22:31.9. Also earning top-20 finishes in a race dominated by the Blue Jays were
Phoebe White (13
th / 22:51.1),
Isabella Stenhouse (15
th / 23:07.2),
Mackenzie Setton (16
th / 23:07.2),
Diana Valentini (18
th / 23:11.4) and
Isabelle Nobili (20
th / 23:16.3).
Hopkins won the meet comfortably with 15 points, with Gettysburg (62) and Swarthmore (81) rounding out the podium. All 15 Blue Jays runners finished in the top 35 in a field of 117 competitors.
Next up for Hopkins is the ECAC Division III Championships Friday, Nov. 8, with races set to begin at 4 p.m.
