The Creighton Track teams earned a victory in the women’s 4×400 meter relay and posted several top-four finishes in the men’s 1,500 meters at the Central Nebraska Challenge held on March 29 at Kearney High School in Kearney, Nebraska.
These results mark a promising start to the spring season for both the men’s and women’s squads as they prepare for upcoming competitions.
Head coach Chris Gannon said, “Solid opener for the squad. Most of the team ran outside of their primary event as part of a bigger training block approach for the spring. We have had a really good training segment, so this was a fun way to cap that off and prep for the main part of the season ahead.”
On the men’s side, Noah Jodon finished second in the 1,500 meters with a time of 3:53.04—also marking his performance as second-best in program history. Eli Moore (4:04.95) and Dominic Ricci (4:06.50) took third and fourth place respectively in that event. Logan Piper placed sixth in the 400-meter hurdles with a time of 55.63 seconds, while Tommy Murray led three Bluejays finishers in the men’s 800 meters with his sixteenth-place result at 1:57.90.
The men’s relay team—composed of Kyle Nelson, Piper, Michael Bianco and Connor Nicholson—set a school record by running fifth overall with a time of 3:21.41.
For Creighton’s women’s team, Anika Nettekoven, Natalee Gehred, Carly Manchester and Alexis Huddin won their section of the women’s 4×400 relay while setting another school record at 3:56.34; another Bluejay quartet finished third at six seconds behind them.
Other notable performances included Sarah Vaske placing fifth (4:53.42) and Taylor Rorick sixth (4:55.31) in their respective heats of the women’s 1,500 meters; Gehred also achieved eleventh place in her heat of the women’s 200 meters with her personal best time.
Creighton is scheduled to compete next Friday and Saturday at Lincoln’s Husker Spring Kick-Off.
