TSR Collaboration
Jan 239 min
Written by Conor Daly, Kevin Fischer & Gavin Struve
Additional edits & commentary by Garrett Zatlin & Gavin Struve
Click here to see our Just Missed and Honorable Mention names.
Listed eligibility takes redshirts and Covid-related extensions into consideration.
TFRRS is used as a general, but not strict, guide when determining eligibility.
Was not ranked in our last update.
First number indicates how much the individual has moved in our rankings.
The second number indicates where the individual was ranked in our last update.
20. Rachel Hirschkind, Senior, SUNY Geneseo (Unranked)
Rachel Hirschkind has had a long-standing history of success over the barriers and water pits, but it wasn’t until now that she was able to replicate that success in the flat events on the track.
This past weekend, the SUNY Geneseo ace ran a solid 5:05 (converted) mile. And while that’s a respectable mark which pushed her over the edge into our top-20, it’s not the main reason she finds herself on our rankings. More accurately, it complements the (converted) 16:39 (5k) that she ran alongside her teammates in December.
Hirschkind appears to be leaps and bounds ahead of where she's been in past seasons at this time of the year. Plus, she hasn’t even tested herself in a 3k just yet which could potentially be her best event. It’s the potential upside that she holds that excites us to the point where we couldn’t resist giving her a spot in our rankings.
19. Cyna Madigan, Senior, UW-Oshkosh (0 / 19)
Has not competed since our last rankings update.
18. Riley Capuano, Sophomore, Claremont-Mudd-Scripps (0 / 18)
Has not competed since our last rankings update.
17. Megan Johnson, Junior, Central College (Unranked)
Ahead of our preseason indoor track rankings a month ago, Megan Johnson’s 16:53 (5k) season opener gave us plenty to be excited about -- even though she found herself just short of a top-20 spot. However, her most recent outing gives us just as much excitement and it was enough to push her into our rankings.
At the Prairie Wolf Indoor Invitational, Johnson won the mile in 4:57, giving her top-10 national marks in two different events. At that meet, she also won a 1k in a strong time of 3:00.
In her three races this winter, Johnson has claimed three personal bests, some by considerable margins. With her immense range from the 5k all the way down to the mile (if not the 800 meters), it’s hard to not like this national-caliber star.
16. Deyanneira Colon Maldonado, Junior, Aurora (Unranked)
This Aurora junior increased her stock in a major way this weekend with her double at the Aurora Grand Prix. Battling women from Northwestern and U. of Chicago propelled Deyanneira Colon Maldonado to a pair of personal bests, within a single day no less.
Her 4:56 mile put her a mere two seconds behind D3 ace, Evelyn Battleson-Gunkel, good for the third-fastest time in the country. She later clocked her first sub-10:00 (3k), giving her a second breakthrough mark.
All told, the weekend was a huge development for someone already in the "Honorable Mentions" category of our latest rankings. She already held sneaky-good cross country fitness which led her to All-American honors this past fall. And nowadays, her mile prowess has only led to significant personal bests so far this winter -- and leaves us waiting for more.
With proven aerobic strength and a top time in a middle distance events, Maldonado is seemingly boasting a skillset that is fairly dynamic and nationally competitive.
15. Hope Murphy, Junior, Baldwin Wallace (+1 / 16)
This past weekend, we saw this Baldwin Wallace veteran open up her season in (arguably) her best event. At the Spire Midwest Invitational, Hope Murphy took the win over Division One challengers in a time of 2:14 for 800 meters.
Sure, that time wasn't necessarily insanely fast, but it was still a nice mark that, more importantly, gave her a high-quality win. And given her history, you have to imagine that running this fast this early-on means that she’s well ahead of schedule...right?
Murphy does, after all, have a tendency to run her best races in/near the postseason.
We'll be monitoring how this D3 standout manages the rest of her season. That is, whether she will focus her efforts on the 800 meters or the mile, the latter of which she had more success in during the earlier stages of her career and is a wide-open event in the current Division Three scene.
14. Grace Richardson, Senior, NYU (-1 / 13)
Has not competed since our last rankings update.
13. Caroline McMartin, Senior, Central College (-1 / 12)
After running what will be a national qualifying mark in the 5k back in December, Caroline McMartin decided to test herself over some shorter distances in her first outing of 2024.
The Central College veteran not only contested the same races as her teammate, Megan Johnson, but ran the same times as well! To recap, we’re talking about a 4:57 (mile) and 3:00 (1k) double. In both races, McMartin just barely got the better of Johnson.
When you couple this flex of speed with her 12th place finish from the cross country national meet and you have an incredibly well-rounded distance competitor.
McMartin has been greatly improving over the last year, and this double suggests that her trend will only continue. She only drops a spot in our rankings to make room for a new addition. But make no mistake, McMartin's stock has risen since we last convened.
12. Allison Sibold, Junior, St. Lawrence (Unranked)
After making some impressive progress on the grass this past fall, Allison Sibold opened up her indoor track campaign with a bang. Her converted 4:49 mile at Utica is the top mark in Division Three so far, and last winter it would have FINISHED the regular season at NCAA #2!
The St. Lawrence star followed up that sensational performance with a quiet, but solid, 800-meter win at the Middlebury Winter Classic with a converted mark of 2:17.
As we talked about in last week’s Group Chat article, Sibold looks like an All-American favorite in the mile despite having never qualified for a national meet on the track before. Her momentum is among the absolute best in Division Three right now and she has even proven this past fall that she can be a major name in the longer distances, too.
In theory, Sibold could be an upper-echelon 3k star. Not just in terms of fast she could run over that distance, but also in terms of what kind of damage she could do in a tactical affair at a championship level.
11. Genna Girard, Senior, Williams (-1 / 10)
Genna Girard has raced once since our last update, earning a 19-second victory over 3000 meters at the Little Three Championships. On its own, her mark of 10:08 is a "just okay" result, although the nature and margin of her victory has us putting limited emphasis on that effort.
All told, we don’t have too much to say about this result. We don’t really know anything further about Girard than we knew prior to our preseason rankings. That's why she only moves one spot.
10. Maddie Hannan, Senior, UW-La Crosse (-6 / 4)
After falling to unranked distance talent, Mckayla Felton, over one mile in her season debut, Maddie Hannan takes a small fall to the backend of our top-10 list.
Her three-second defeat was an underwhelming result for sure, but Hannan has built up enough of a resume in previous seasons to remain in the top-half of our rankings. After all, throughout the 2022-23 academic year, she was an All-American over 800 meters on the outdoor oval as well as in the mile on the indoor oval.
Oh, and let's not forget that she was a national qualifier over 3000 meters last winter as well as a national qualifier over 5000 meters last spring -- and a top-half All-American on the grass in 2022.
That kind of range and potency across multiple distances makes her a serious threat throughout the winter, and one race doesn’t change that.
9. Grace Hadley, Senior, WPI (+2 / 11)
Grace Hadley kept busy on the weekend of January 13th-14th.
The WPI star won the mile convincingly at the Lyon Invitational on Saturday with a converted time of 4:58. She then took a quick jaunt 45 minutes to the northeast to compete at the UMass Amherst Flagship Invitational at Boston’s New Balance track. After coming through the first 1000 meters of the 3000 meter race in 3:08, she fell back, but still held on for a respectable 9:59 result. That’s good for a top-10 spot on the D3 national leaderboard.
Given the blazing start and the hard solo mile on her legs from the night before, we can’t be hard on Hadley for a 3k result that seems underwhelming on paper compared to her 16:44 (5k) mark from December. If anything, that effort was nice practice for March should she attempt the 5k/3k double.
Hadley can go forward knowing that her fitness is in as good of a place as virtually any woman in Division Three. We think she still has a lot more in the tank this winter.
8. Aubrie Fisher, Senior, Wartburg (+1 / 9)
Aubrie Fisher is looking solid at this point in the season. Her 9:48 (3k) result at the Cyclone Open may not be jaw-dropping compared to her personal best of 9:33 (which she ran at last year’s indoor national meet), but it’s tough to expect her to fully arrive at that point in January.
Fisher's fastest 3k time in the month of January was a 9:47 mark that she posted two years ago, so for the most part, she’s just about where we would expect her to be in the early stages of the track season:
The often reliable Wartburg veteran is still very much on track to once again be a serious scoring threat when the indoor national meet arrives. Historically, Fisher peaks fairly well for the postseason and nothing that we've seen from her as of late would make us believe that she won't do so again.
7. Brigid Hanley, Junior, Emory (0 / 7)
Has not competed since our last rankings update.
6. Maddie Kelly, Senior, U. of Chicago (-3 / 3)
Has not competed since our last rankings update.
5. Lexi Brown, Senior, Wartburg (+3 / 8)
After this past Friday, Lexi Brown holds one of the better results of this young indoor track season in Division Three. The Wartburg ace won a 3k convincingly over standout teammates Shaelyn Hostager and the aforementioned Aubrie Fisher. Not only that, but she took down a slew of Division One talents in a tightly contested 9:43 victory!
That mark has Brown sitting at MCAA #1 on the D3 national leaderboards and in line for a major bounce back from a less-than-desirable end to her 2023 cross country campaign.
That effort also has us eager to see if (and how) she races the mile and the 5k, events where she's historically been just as good. And with nothing but positives to say about Brown, we felt that it was only appropriate to give her a boost into our top-five.
4. Natalie Bitetti, Senior, Claremont-Mudd-Scripps (+2 / 6)
Has not competed since our last rankings update.
3. Evelyn Battleson-Gunkel, Junior, U. of Chicago (+2 / 5)
After a breakout cross country season, it was only natural that Evelyn Battleson-Gunkel should soon return to the event in which she's experienced the most success. And after a mid-January runner-up performance in the half-mile, she did just that.
At the Aurora Grand Prix, a week after her season debut, Battleson-Gunkel produced another 2nd place performance, this time only losing to Division One talent, Ava Earl (Northwestern). The time that the Maroon star produced, a 4:54 mark, was within a half-second of her PR and it placed her at NCAA #2 over that distance this season.
Battleson-Gunkel's young season has already signaled that she's one of the best distance talents in the nation. But considering that she can easily move up in distance and hasn't raced anything longer than a mile yet, this U. Chicago standout seemingly has tons of untapped upside despite sitting at TSR #3 in these rankings.
2. Emma Kelley, Senior, Washington U. (0 / 2)
One race was all it took for Emma Kelley to reassert her dominance over the Division Three women's 800-meter scene. And if not for Fiona Smith, Kelley would be a more-than-deserving TSR #1 talent.
The Washington U. veteran and soon-to-be Wisconsin Badger recently produced a 10-second win (over a teammate listed in our "Honorable Mentions" section, no less) with a 2:05 conversion! That result puts her comfortably at NCAA #1 this winter.
Kelley also ran an NCAA #3 converted 400-meter mark (56.62) a week later.
There's not much more to say about Kelley right now given that we didn't learn anything new about her (which isn't necessarily a bad thing). At this point, you can just about wake us up after the Ides of March have passed and she's assuredly secured another national title.
1. Fiona Smith, Junior, St. Benedict (0 / 1)
Has not competed since our last rankings update.
Allison Sibold (St. Lawrence)
Deyanneira Colon Maldonado (Aurora)
Megan Johnson (Central College)
Rachel Hirschkind (SUNY Geneseo)
KICKED OFF
Sara Stephenson (Johns Hopkins)
Carolyn Shult (UW-Eau Claire)
Ella Ball (Williams)
Ellie Rising (George Fox)
JUST MISSED (in no particular order)
Sara Stephenson (Johns Hopkins)
Ellie Rising (George Fox)
Dale Leonard (Ramapo)
Gillian Roeder (MIT)
Kirsi Rajagopal (MIT)
Penelope Greene (SUNY Geneseo)
Hannah Preisser (Carleton)
Audrey Maclean (Middlebury)
Vivian Kane (NYU)
Lexi Fernandez (MIT)
Julia Howarth (MIT)
Shaelyn Hostager (Wartburg)
Mckayla Felton (UW-Stout)
Annie Huang (Johns Hopkins)
Elisabeth Camic (U. of Chicago)
Chrissy Aman (Bates)
HONORABLE MENTIONS (in no particular order)
Kate Sanderson (MIT)
Molly FitzGibbons (Williams)
Riley Buese (Lewis & Clark)
Morgan Uhlhorn (NYU)
Amelia Lehman (UW-Oshkosh)
Caitlin Jorgensen (U. of Chicago)
Ella Webster (Wittenburg)
Sarah Conant (Johns Hopkins)
Lauren Iagnemma (Case Western)
Elizabeth Csikai (Emory)
Elle Marsyla (Claremont-Mudd-Scripps)
Rebecca Markham (Hope)
Ellie Meyer (Wartburg)
Rachel Krouse (UW-Stevens Point)
Kayla Werner (Lynchburg)
Helen Cross (Carleton)
Lucy Gagnon (Williams)
Jenna Allman (Calvin)
Cat Wimmer (U. of Chicago)
Alessia Sarussi (Washington U.)
Danielle Schultz (Washington U.)
Notes
- Carolyn Shult (previously TSR #15) and Ella Ball (previously TSR #17) are no longer listed on their respective teams' 2023-24 track and field rosters. As such, The Stride Report has removed them from this update of our rankings.