Meet of Champions 2025 Recap

Photos by tspimages for MileSplit.

Mercer County sent 29 individuals and relay teams to the biggest and best meet in New Jersey — the NJSIAA Meet of Champions. Even on a hot and muggy afternoon at the end of a long season, there were plenty of season’s bests and inspiring performances!

Boys Results

Boys Sprints. Allentown’s Gavin Alvarez capped an incredible season with a Meet of Champions medal and another PR in the 200m, where he ran 21.73 for 7th place. In the 400m, WWP South junior Julius Kinsler finished 2nd in his heat and 12th overall with another great time of 48.73, just 0.1 off his PR.

Boys Hurdles. In the 110mH, Notre Dame’s Christopher Young ran a very fast 14.27 to advance to the finals. He went down in the finals but picked himself up and finished the race to earn his 8th-place medal. His teammate Aldric Crawford also earned a 7th-place medal in the 400mH with a new PR of 54.38. He had a massive final 150m, moving from 8th to 2nd in his heat.

Boys Relays. The WWP North 4x800m boys climbed the podium after a huge race to take 6th place! They came in with a season’s best of 8:07 but crushed that time with a sub-8 performance of 7:59.67. Freshman Agrim Jha lead things off with a 2:02.19, Luke Ferrer followed that with a season’s best split of 2:00.93, Jordan Andrade kept the momentum going with a 2:02.01, and then Subomi Allison dropped an incredible anchor leg of 1:54.56. He passed four teams in his last lap alone to secure the 6th-place medal for the Knights.

In the 4x100m, Allentown’s star senior sprinters Cedric Mbachu, Matthew Woode, Scott Jordan, and Gavin Alvarez matched their season’s best almost exactly to take 10th place in 42.34.

Boys Throws. Princeton’s Sean Wilton finished just off the podium in his final Meet of Champions with a throw of 57-1.5 for 9th place. Nottingham senior Ernest Gaykai threw 48-10 to take 27th place. Wilton also qualified in the discus, where he threw 146-3 to get 23rd place.

Girls Results

Girls Sprints. Lawrence’s Samya Jenkins equaled her PR in the 200m with a 25.17 to get 14th place overall, and she also placed 21st in the 100m with a 12.38. 

Wilberforce’s Stella Blanchard had a fantastic day and came home with new PRs in both the 400m and 200m. In the 400m, she took 15th place in a very fast 57.76, which is a new school record and #3 in Mercer County this season. She doubled back in the 200m and cut 0.3 off her PR with a 26.46 for 22nd place.

Girls Hurdles. WWP South senior Adama Turay has been on fire over the high hurdles in the past month, and she kept that going by dropping another big PR in the prelims – a wind-legal 14.70! That’s currently #2 in Mercer County for the 100mH, an event that Turay just picked up this season. She went on to run 15.03 in the finals – which would have been her PR just a week ago – and she came away with an 8th-place medal. Lawrence senior Alicia Riggins also qualified for her first Meet of Champions and ran 15.20 to finish 15th overall.

In the 400mH, Princeton Day sophomore Della Gilligan ran 1:06.05 for 24th place in her first Meet of Champions. WWP South’s Anastasia Kudin also qualified for this meet but had to drop out about 200m into her race.

Girls Distance. WWP North’s Allison Lee earned the silver medal in a fast and exciting girls 3200m! Using a 74-second final lap, Lee held off the 3rd and 4th place by less than 1 second and finished in a time of 10:31.91, just 3 seconds back from winner Leah Starkey from Ocean Township. In the other heat of the 3200m, Princeton’s Kajol Karra ran a season’s best of 11:01.19 for 15th place overall. 

In the 800m, Notre Dame freshman Alaina Sabo ran 2:16.15, her second-fastest time ever, to get 18th place. Wilberforce’s Laura Sallade finished in 22nd place with a 2:18.50.

Girls Relays. In the 4x100m, Ewing became the first CVC team to go sub-49 this year with a 48.89 for 18th place. The whole quartet – Faith Settles, Leah Daniels, Karis Crossland, and Angel Johnson – are underclassmen who will be back next year.  

The Wilberforce 4x400m team of Stella Blanchard, Adeline Edwards, Gwen Mersereau, and Laura Sallade cut 5 seconds off their time from last weekend to take 23rd place in 4:03.45, which is #3 in Mercer County.

Girls Throws. Mercer County’s best event may be the girls discus, where it sent four girls to the Meet of Champions! That group was led by Trenton senior Sonjay Baylor-Reeves. After an injury forced Baylor-Reeves to shift her focus from the shot put to the discus, Baylor-Reeves not only made her first Meet of Champions in the event but also wound up on the podium with a 7th-place throw of 130-0. Also getting their first Meet of Champions experience were a trio of underclassmen: WWP North sophomore Eva Gedrich (18th in 114-8), Allentown junior Makayla Rondinelli (20th in 113-2), and Hopewell Valley junior Uchenna Obidike (27th in 102-6).

In the javelin, Nottingham’s Ti’Kayla Smith had her second-farthest throw ever, a 110-5, to get 16th place.

Girls Jump. In the long jump, Hightstown freshman Chloe Lewis opened her day by crushing her school record with a 6-inch PR of 17-10! And then, just for good measure, she went 17-10.5 on the next jump, finishing 14th overall. That #1 in the county this year and easily the farthest a Mercer County freshman has ever jumped. 

Princeton Day’s Kara Vandal also qualified in the long jump and went 16-10.5 for 24th place, just 2 inches off her PR. Hamilton West senior Zairra Galloway jumped 36-3 in the triple jump, just 2 inches off her PR, to get 16th place. In the high jump, Hamilton West’s Nyviah Pacheco didn’t clear the opening height but capped off a great year with her first Meet of Champions experience.