Groups Boys: Crawford blazes to NPB 400mH title, Bennett leads Princeton Day to three wins
Mercer County’s best took on the rest of the state at the NJSIAA Group Championships last weekend, and they put on a show.
Across three sites — Franklin (Groups 1 and 4), Northern Burlington (Groups 2 and 3), and Buena (Non-Public A and B) — nine Mercer County boys and four relay teams punched tickets to the Meet of Champions, more than a dozen athletes earned medals, and seniors across the county closed out their high-school careers with lifetime bests.
Congrats to these group champions and other qualifiers for the Meet of Champions!
Aldric Crawford (Notre Dame, Sr.) — 1st in NPA 400mH, 7th in NPA 400m
Nathan Bennett (Princeton Day, Jr.) — 1st in NPB 400m
Princeton Day (Cy Cooper, Carter Price, Ethan Mack, Nathan Bennett) — 1st in NPB 4×100m
Princeton Day (Cooper, Price, Mack, Bennett) — 1st in NPB 4×400m
Agrim Jha (WWP North, So.) — 2nd in G3 3200m
Jamel Williams (Hamilton West, Jr.) — 2nd in G3 long jump
Julius Kinsler (WWP South, Sr.) — 3rd in G4 400m
Zamir Jones (Notre Dame, Sr.) — 4th in NPA 110mH
Yi-Tian Xiong (Princeton, Jr.) — 4th in G4 110mH prelims
Finnegan Curley (Hopewell Valley, Jr.) — 5th in G3 3200m
Bryce Marsh (Notre Dame, Sr.) — 5th in NPA high jump
WWP North (Agrim Jha, Paul Wittenberg, Krrish Sheth, Rohan Varma) — 7th in G3 4×800m
Ewing (Dasan Jones, Kha-Neaf Mack Hornsby, Zaydin Boyce, Domonique Jones) — 8th in G3 4×100m
Hurdles
Aldric Crawford (Notre Dame, Sr.) started off the weekend with a bang, claiming the Non-Public A 400mH championship in 53.40. The Irish senior got out strong and held off the field down the final straightaway to win by almost a full second. That time chopped 0.4 off his lifetime best and moved him to NJ #4 on the season. He’s the first Mercer County boy since 2019 to go sub-53.5 in the 400mH.
Crawford’s win kickstarted a big weekend for the Irish hurdlers in Non-Public A. Zamir Jones (Notre Dame, Sr.) lowered his 110mH PR to 14.42 for 4th in the 110m hurdles, which also earned him an MOC wildcard ticket. Matt Ryba (Notre Dame, Jr.) added a 6th-place medal in the 400mH in 57.17 and dropped a new 110mH PR of 15.62 for 14th place in the high hurdles. Bryce Marsh (Notre Dame, Sr.) reached the 110mH final after running a big PR of 14.52 in prelims, and he finished 8th overall.
Yi-Tian Xiong (Princeton) sets a new 110mH PR in the prelims before later punshing his ticket to the Meet of Champions with a 6th-place medal in the Group 4 final on May 30, 2026. | Tom Horak for NJ.com
The fastest 110mH of the day — at least among CVC boys — went to Yi-Tian Xiong (Princeton, Jr.), who claimed the 6th-place medal in the Group 4 final at 14.32 after also running a blazing 14.26 in the prelims. That new PR lowered his county-leading mark and moved Xiong to NJ #17 for the season. His 14.32 in the final also earned him a spot at the Meet of Champions.
In Group 3, Tyson Brown (Ewing, Jr.) ran a season’s best in the 400mH to take 13th in 58.17, and Alexander Nikolov (Lawrence, Jr.) placed 9th in the 110mH after running 14.85 to trim a hundredth off his PR. In Group 1, Anthony McBride (Thrive Charter, So.) broke a minute for the first time in the 400mH, running 59.93 for 12th.
Distance
Agrim Jha (WWP North, So.) powered to 2nd place in the Group 3 3200m in 9:16.45, getting a well-deserved automatic qualifier for the Meet of Champions. He finished just behind Morris Hills’ Nicholas Falcone after those two pulled away from the pack when the kicking began from 800m out.
Finnegan Curley (Hopewell Valley, Jr.) also ran with the leaders through the first six laps of the Group 3 3200m and came away with a 5th-place medal and a time of 9:25.16 that earned him a wildcard to the Meet of Champions.
Paul Wittenberg (WWP North, Jr.), who was 7th in Group 3 with a 9:35.86, and Saboor Qureshi (Princeton, Sr.), who placed 13th in Group 4 at 9:40.94, finished just outside that Meet of Champions 3200m cutoff.
Tyler Hurst (Steinert, Sr.) was one of the only CVC distance boys to double last weekend, and he delivered an impressive showing at the Group 3 championships. In the 800m on Friday, he ran a season’s best of 1:57.87, which is #3 in Mercer County. The next day, he medaled in the 1600m out of the lower-seeded heat in 4:25.19. When the pace slowed on the second lap, Hurst took control and powered away to win by the heat by 3 seconds. He finished just 0.12 seconds outside the MOC wildcard cutoff.
Other notable 1600m results include Rohan Varma (WWP North, So.) finishing 9th in Group 3 at 4:28.89, and John O'Leary (Allentown, Sr.) running 4:31.09 for 12th in Group 2.
WWP North’s stellar distance squad is sending a 4×800m team to the Meet of Champions after Agrim Jha, Paul Wittenberg, Krrish Sheth, and Rohan Varma combined to run 8:09.65 for 7th place in Group 3 and earn a MOCs wildcard.
In the Non-Public B 3200m, Caed Wilson (Wilberforce, So.) and Elias Edwards (Wilberforce, Jr.) ran PRs of 10:37.96 and 10:49.31 to earn 4th- and 6th-place medals for the Wolverines.
Sprints
In a very competitive Group 4 400m on Saturday, Julius Kinsler (WWP South, Sr.) took 3rd place in 48.49 to advance to the Meet of Champions and set the stage for an exciting rematch. Later in the day, Kinsler added a 9th-place finish in the 200m at 22.37.
Aldric Crawford (Notre Dame, Sr.) doubled back from his 400mH championship on Friday to book another spot at the Meet of Champions, this time in the 400m. His result of 50.14 got him 7th place in Non-Public A and earned him one of the final MOC wildcard entries.
In Group 3, teammates Dasan Jones (Ewing, Sr.) and Kha-Neaf Mack Hornsby (Ewing, Sr.) both made the final and finished just 0.01 apart, with Jones taking 5th in 11.09 and Hornsby finishing 7th in 11.10. While they were both just barely on the wrong side of the wildcard cutoff in the 100m, they’ll still be going to the Meet of Champions along with Zaydin Boyce and Domonique Jones after the quartet ran 42.97 to place 8th in the Group 3 4×100m and qualify for the Meet of Champions there.
Nathan Bennett (Princeton Day) claims the 400m title at the Non-Public B Group Championships on May 30, 2026. | Al Amrhein for NJ.com
The Princeton Day sprinters had themselves an incredible weekend, winning group championships in the 4×100m, 4×400m, and 400m.
The Panthers opened on Friday with the quartet of Cy Cooper, Carter Price, Ethan Mack, and Nathan Bennett running a season’s best of 44.59 to win the 4×100m title by just 0.1 seconds. That win marked Princeton Day’s first-ever group championship in a spring track event.
The next morning, Nathan Bennett (Princeton Day, Jr.) added an individual title to his school name by dominating the Non-Public B 400m, winning by nearly a second in 50.50 to claim the championship and qualify for the Meet of Champions.
Princeton Day then closed out the meet with the same lineup from the 4×100m — Cooper, Price, Mack, and Bennett — doubling back to win a dramatic 4×400m, which involved Bennett splitting a 48.9 to make up a 3-second gap and go from 3rd to 1st on the anchor leg.
Also in Non-Public B, Aaron Szeliga (Wilberforce, Jr.) medaled 6th in the 100m at 11.27 — along with a PR of 11.24 in the prelims — and he also set a 200m PR of 22.91 for 7th place there.
Jumps & Throws
Jamel Williams (Hamilton West, Sr.) unleashed a long jump of 23-8 to claim the silver medal in Group 3 and auto-qualify for the Meet of Champions. He’s now flown 23’ in each of his past three meets.
In Non-Public A, Bryce Marsh (Notre Dame, Sr.) made a PR-tying clearance of 6-2 on his first attempt to earn the 5th-place medal and snag a MOC wildcard qualifier. Teammate Kendrick Mullen (Notre Dame, So.) matched that 6-2 mark to take 8th and finish just outside the MOC cutoff based on attempts.
In addition to Williams, there were quite a few other CVC boys who posted big PRs in the long jump last weekend.
Braxton Rondinelli (Allentown, Jr.) added 7 inches to his PR with a 21-9.5 for 9th place in Group 2, just two inches shy of making it to the Meet of Champions.
Isaiah Grier (Lawrence, Sr.) had the most eye-popping improvement, going from a 20-3 that narrowly advanced him from sectionals to a 21-7 that got him 9th in all of Group 3.
Teriyon Page (Thrive Charter, Sr.) also extended his long jump PR by nearly a foot with a leap of 21-5.5, which earned him a 6th-place medal in Group 1.
In the Group 3 high jump, Daveron Jallah (Hamilton West, Sr.) cleared 6-0 for the first time to tie for 9th place.
The most notable throwing result among Mercer County boys was from Marjon Skillman (Thrive Charter, Sr.), who threw a PR of 48-2 in the Group 1 shot put to finish just outside the medals in 7th place. He’s now #3 in Mercer County this spring.