Alyssa Pirinelli ’10 competed at St. Lawrence before she matriculated. One of three winners of the 2006-07 Ronald C. Hoffmann First-Year Scholar-Athlete Award, she first competed at St. Lawrence as a North Tonawanda High School senior, winning the girls’ shot put in the June 2006 New York State High School Championships at the Merrick Pinkard Track complex. That was just the start of Pirinelli’s success in the shot at St. Lawrence.

An outstanding student who resides in the Doctors of Tomorrow theme house and majors in chemistry, Alyssa set the St. Lawrence indoor shot put record on her first collegiate throw and improved it by two meters in winning her first collegiate competition. She won the shot in every regular-season meet during the 2006-07 indoor season and won the Liberty League, New York State Collegiate Track and Field Conference and the ECAC indoor championships, setting a league championship record with a throw nearly a meter longer than the previous record. She went on to finish third in the NCAA Division III championships in the shot, the first St. Lawrence woman track and field athlete to earn All America status as a first-year student.

Her outdoor season began the same way the indoor one did: she set the St. Lawrence record in the outdoor shot in her first meet. She again went unbeaten in the regular season and won Liberty League, NYSCTC and ECAC titles in the shot. She finished in the top 12 in the NCAA championship. She also had several top finishes in the discus during the outdoor season and took up the hammer for the first time, finishing third in the Liberty League championships.