WINTER COLLEGE ATHLETES, PART 2 - Sullivan on 5th-place NCAA relay; swimmers finish senior seasons

WINTER COLLEGE ATHLETES, PART 2

Nearly 20 student-athletes with local ties appeared on rosters and/or in competition for colleges and universities of all sizes during the 2024-25 winter sports season.

An overview of their successes and achievements has been done in two parts, ending this week with reports from indoor track and field, women’s swimming and the first-ever acrobatics and tumbling team at the University of Montevallo, which includes Medford’s Kyla Krause.

Indoor T& F

Another season, another national championship for the UW-La Crosse men, who breezed to their third straight NCAA Division III indoor team title and the program’s 21st overall. UW-L has won 14 of the last 21 D-III men’s indoor championships.

The Eagles, who include 2022 Medford graduate Joey Sullivan, won three individual titles and scored 84 points, which broke the D-III championship record of 78, which had been held by the 2006 UW-La Crosse squad. UW-Oshkosh was a distant second with 39 points, while Rowan University of New Jersey was third with 32.

The national meet was hosted March 14-15 by Nazareth University and held at the Golisano Training Center in Rochester, N.Y.

Sullivan was part of UW-L’s distance medley relay team that finished fifth out of 12 qualifying teams. The Eagles finished in 9:55.73, just 0.03 seconds behind fourthplace Amherst. Johns Hopkins won the race in 9:52.43, just ahead of Lynchburg (9:52.92) and MIT (9:54.18).

Sullivan, a junior, led off and ran the first 1,200 meters of the 4,000-meter race. His time was 3:04.67. The Eagles were in seventh place when he handed the baton off to Tyler Backes, a senior from Neenah, who had a 49.52-second split in the 400-meter leg. Dirk Lueck, a graduate student from Berlin, ran the 800-meter leg in 1:54.04 and Adam Loenser, a senior from Clear Lake, finished it off with a time of 4:07.52 in the 1,600-meter leg.

The fifth-place finish gave the team NCAA All-American honors.

Sullivan primarily ran longer distances for the Eagles this winter. He placed fifth in the 3,000-meter run at the Wisconsin Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (WIAC) championships held Feb. 28March 1 at UW-Stevens Point. His time was 8:30.11. UW-Whitewater’s Christian Patzka won the race in 8:14.63. He led a group of four UW-L runners in the event. The Eagles easily won the conference team title with 217.5 points, well ahead of runner-up UW-Oshkosh (133.5).

Sullivan’s best 3,000 time of the winter was 8:17.55, set in the Jan. 25 Pat Healy Classic hosted by UW-L. He finished in sixth place. Sullivan ran the mile three times with a personal-best time of 4:10.29, good for third at the La Crosse Final Qualifier on March 8. He was 1.87 seconds behind winner Mason Shea of UW-Eau Claire. He was timed at 4:11.32 and won the event at UW-L’s Caged Eagle Invitational on Feb. 21 to set a meet record. He beat Loenser by 0.97 seconds.

Sullivan ran the 5,000-meter race at the Feb. 14-15 Midwest Elite Invitational at UW-Whitewater and finished 21st out of 100 runners in a personal-best 14:14.6.

Meredith Richter, a 2024 Medford graduate and freshman at NCAA Division I University of Nebraska-Omaha placed ninth in the women’s 800-meter run and was part of the sixth-place distance medley team at the Summit League Indoor Championships, hosted Feb. 28-March 1 by South Dakota State.

The relay team set the 10th-fastest time in program history at 12:21.8. The quartet included Lily Schwartz, a sophomore from Lincoln, Neb.; Ava Robinson, a sophomore from Aurora, Colo., and Maya Bergstrom, a freshman from Carlisle, Iowa. As the third runner, Richter took the 800-meter leg. South Dakota State won the race in 11:47.13, 2.51 seconds ahead of North Dakota State. Omaha beat Kansas City (12:37.19) and Oral Roberts (12:43.9).

Richter ran a season-best time of 2:13.36 in the 800-meter preliminaries and came up one place and 0.29 seconds shy of qualifying for the final.

The Mavericks finished seventh in the team standings for the two-day meet with 13 points, beating Oral Roberts (3). North Dakota State (188.5) and North Dakota (151) were the top two teams.

Richter had a busy winter, competing in seven meets. At the Mark Schuck Open Jan. 31-Feb. 1 in Mankato, Minn., she place third out of 26 finishers in the 800meter run at 2:17.84. Loyal graduate Savannah Schley of Minnesota-Duluth won in 2:14.88. Richter was 0.27 seconds behind Isabela Shepard of Minnesota State. Richter was part of Omaha’s second-place distance medley team, which finished in 12:39.5 behind Minnesota State (12:11.51).

Richter was ninth in the 800 at 2:15.11 at South Dakota State Feb. 14-15 and 17th in 2:15.77 at the Iowa State Classic on Feb. 8. She was third in the 400-meter dash at 59.67 seconds at the 2025 Nebraska Tune-Up on Feb. 21, trailing Reba Mader of Fort Hays State (56.92) and Robinson (58.04). She ran the mile at South Dakota State’s Jim Emmerich Alumni Meet on Jan. 25 and placed 19th in 5:17.1 and was part of Omaha’s ninth-place 4x400-meter relay team.

Ellee Grunwald, a 2021 Medford graduate, was part of the St. Norbert College women’s team that won the program’s 10th straight indoor title in the Midwest Conference. The Green Knghts compiled 249.83 points to easily outscore runner-up Aurora University (127.83).

Grunwald, a senior, was part of two scoring events, including the conferencechampion distance medley team. Grunwald led off in the 800-meter leg. She was followed by Ally Zickert, a senior from Hartford; Gretchen Lane, a senior from Melbourne Beach, Fla., and Olivia Ship, a senior from Henderson, Nev., as they won the race in 13:03.89, 0.53 seconds ahead of Concordia University of Wisconsin and well ahead of five other teams.

Grunwald took sixth in the mile run in 5:38.7. That put three points on the board for the Green Knights. She was 3.52 seconds away from the top five in a race won by Aurora’s Deyanne Colon Maldonado in 5:17.75.

Earlier in the winter, Grunwald won the 3,000-meter run at Ripon College’s Dick Hendricks Invitational. Her time of 11:17.21 was a personal-best and beat teammate Ella Jerdee by 9.57 seconds. She ran the 3,000 at UW-Whitewater’s Leonard “Squig” Converse Invitational Jan. 31-Feb. 1 and took 16th in 11:27.7 and she was 21st at the Samford Indoor Open on Jan. 18 with at time of 11:40.98.

Grunwald set a college-best time of 5:36.34 while placing 15th in the mile run at the Ripon College Red Hawk Invite on Feb. 8 and she was 13th in the 800-meter run at 2:39.2. She was eighth in the mile with a time of 5:38.26 in the UW-Oshkosh Titan Challenge Feb. 22.

Steven Petkau, a 2020 Rib Lake graduate, triple jumped during the indoor season for Crown College and placed second in the Upper Midwest Athletic Conference Indoor Championships, held Feb. 28-March 1 and hosted by UWSuperior.

Petkau, who is the school’s indoor record holder in both the triple and long jumps, didn’t quite reach his triple jump record of 13.49 meters (44 feet, 3.25 inches) from last year this winter. His best jump at the conference meet covered 13.17 meters (43-2.5) and left him 6.75 inches behind champion Jeremiah Stanton of Martin Luther. The Crown College Polars placed third out of seven teams in the final standings with 91 points, trailing UWSuperior (242) and Martin Luther (184).

The senior placed third at the St. Olaf Invitational Jan. 24-25 with a jump of 417.75, eighth at the South Dakota State Open Jan. 31-Feb. 1 at 40-4.75, fourth at the Carleton Meet of Hearts Feb. 8 at 419.25 and third at the Minnesota State Maverick Premier Feb. 15 at 41-7.

Gracie Tallier, a 2023 Gilman graduate and UW-River Falls volleyball player, sprinted for the Falcons during the indoor track season, competing individually in the 60-, 200- and 400meter dashes and filling some relay positions as well.

Tallier posted her best times in all three dashes at the University of Minnesota’s Snowshoe Open, held on Friday, Feb. 21.

Tallier placed 11th out of 28 entrants in the 60-meter preliminaries in 8.12 seconds, missing a top-nine spot in the finals by 0.05 seconds. She was 11th out of 32 sprinters in the 200-meter dash results at 27.45 seconds. She tied Aninka Elvrum of St. Thomas for 10th, but Elvrum won the tiebreaker, 27.442 to 27.444. In her only 400-meter dash of the spring, Tallier was 16th in 1:05.59.

That 400 prepared her for the WIAC Indoor Championships, where she was part of UW-RF’s 4x400-meter relay team that placed seventh in 4:11.2, beating UWWhitewater by 1.57 seconds. UW-La Crosse’s team won in 3:49.31.

Tallier was second in the 60-meter dash during the UW-RF Winter Classic on Feb. 8. She had a time of 8.15 seconds in the final, trailing only Zari Young of St. Mary’s (7.87). She was also second in the prelims at 8.19 seconds. Tallier was fourth out of 20 sprinters in the 200-meter dash at 27.73 seconds. Young won that in 26.85 seconds.

At UWSuperior’s Maday Classic Feb. 15, Tallier was fourth out of seven finalists in the 60 at 8.12 seconds, fifth out of 13 sprinters in the 200 at 27.76 seconds and part of the Falcons’ third-place 4x200-meter relay team that finished in 1:53.44, ahead of UW-Superior (1:58.32) and behind two Minnesota-Duluth teams (1:44.03 and 1:46.85).

Tallier had a strong opener Dec. 14 at the College of St. Scholastica, taking fifth

Joey Sullivan

Meredith Richter

Ellee Grunwald

Steven Petkau

Gracie Tallier