PIRINELLI WINS TWO EVENTS, SAINTS WIN LIBERTY LEAGUE MEET; RANKED 12TH IN DIII

Feb. 16: While St. Lawrence University’s women’s indoor track and field roster is dominated by first and second year collegiate athletes, it also has good young talent and that talent extended the Saint string of Liberty League indoor championships to four and six out of the last seven as the Saints pulled away from Rensselaer to win at the Newell Field House Saturday afternoon.

The Saints are ranked 12th nationally in the USTFCCCA Division III Coaches Power Rankings, and are second among Eastern teams with only fourth ranked Tufts in front of them.

Sophomore Alyssa Pirinelli, the Liberty League co-Field Performer of the Week, won both weight events and was joined as league champion by Alexis Nuffer and Rookie of the Week Wendy Pavlus with the 4x400 relay team also winning a league title as the Saints finished with 161.5 points, RPI with 153, Hamilton with 122.5 and Union with 50.

The expected back and forth battle for the women’s team championship started early in the meet as Hamilton, the Saints and RPI were all within 3.5 points of each other after the first four events were in the book and the margins flexed as each event was scored. The Saint women trailed RPI by 12.5 points after six events, but led by 14.5 five events later. The Red Hawks closed within five of the Saints with four events to go, but wins by Pavlus in the 5000 and the 4x400 relay team of Chelsea McKenzie, Kelsey Rebehn, Elizabeth Atwood and Nuffer plus second in the triple jump by Jessica Venezia helped the Saints pull away for the win.

Pirinelli collected the first Saint championship of the day as she won her third straight Liberty League shot put title with a 13.14 meter (43-1.50) throw. She has surpassed the NCAA provisional mark in every meet so far this season. Pirinelli surpassed Felicia Tsai’s record in the weight throw by .13 meters with a 15.61 (51-2.75) meter throw for her second win of the day. That throw also improved on her NCAA provisional qualification status in that event. Lauren Chrapowitzky finished fifth and Holly Iron was sixth in the weight for the Saints while Lisa Baron was fifth in the shot.

Nuffer and Chelsea McKenzie went one-two in the 800 meters to give the Saints 16 points in that event with Nuffer winning in 2:21.80 and McKenzie finishing just under five seconds back in 2:26.74. McKenzie ran the lead leg and Nuffer the anchor with Rebehn and Atwood to win the 4x400 in 4:15.55. Pavlus won the 5000 in 18:24.53 with Hillary St. John finishing third and earlier in the meet Pavlus finished second in the mile in 5:12.93 as the first two runners in the event broke the existing league record. Katrina Loignon was fourth in the mile.

St. Lawrence also picked up 18 points in the long jump as Venezia was second with a 5.07 meter (16-7.75) jump, Whitney Koch was third at 4.64 meters and Meaghan White was fourth with a 4.61 meter jump. Venezia was second with a 11.29 meter jump (37-0.5) in the triple jump with Koch finishing fifth.

Beth Muller finished second in 7.52 seconds and Venezia scored with a sixth place finish in the 55 meter dash.

The Saint Distance Medley Relay team of Lindsay Bisaccio, Kelsey Rebehn, Elizabeth Atwood and Michelle Laframboise finished third in 13:28.60.

Other scorers for the Saints included Emily Bean, who was fourth in the pole vault at 2.63 meters with Stacy Lowell tying for fifth in the same event. Sarah Mills tied for third with a 1.38 meter jump in the high jump. Atwood also cleared 1.38 meters, but scored in fifth place based on number of attempts. Lindsey Taylor was third in 61.37, Koch was fourth in 63.25 and Meghan Moore was fifth in 64.14 in the 400 meters. White was fifth and Maia Moyer was sixth in the 55 hurdles. Muller turned in her second top-three performance of the day with a third in the 200 in 27.22 seconds and the Saint 4x200 relay team of Taylor, Koch, Venezia and Muller finished third in 1:51.65 as the top three teams in that race all broke the Liberty League record.