Hillsdale's Averi Parker did one better on Friday after two runner-up finishes on Wednesday and Thursday at the G-MAC Outdoor Championships hosted by Ashland.

The junior captured the G-MAC title in the discus with a personal best throw of 45.98 meters, adding to second place finishes in both the hammer throw and shot put earlier in the week. Three top two finishes made Parker the easy choice for G-MAC Field Athlete of the Meet, as the junior racked up 36 total points all by herself across the three events. 

An eight-time G-MAC placer entering this week, Parker's win in the discus is the past All-American's first outright G-MAC title at Hillsdale, and also the program's first ever G-MAC Female Field Athlete of the Meet award winner. Parker will look to add to her accomplishments at the NCAA DII Outdoor Championships at the end of May in Pueblo, Colorado, where she has a good chance to be competing in both the hammer and shot put.

Mackenzie Morrison also placed for Hillsdale in the discus, finishing seventh with a throw of 41.20 meters for the Chargers, who racked up several strong finishes on the final day of conference meet competition.

The Chargers also had multiple placers in the 1,500m run, as freshman Evyn Humphrey took third with a new personal best of 4:25.66 and improving her provisional qualifying mark to 25th in the nation, fully in the conversation for a trip to the NCAA DII Outdoor Championships. Teammate Savannah Fraley also ran a personal best to finish sixth in 4:39.37.

Hillsdale also had multiple athletes score in two other field events. Reagan Dahlquist took fourth with a clearance of 1.59 meters in the high jump, while freshman Aubrie Wilson tied for seventh with a height of 1.54 meters. In the triple jump, Grace Chen took sixth with a personal best leap of 11.32 meters, while freshman Katie Kennedy was close behind in eighth with a distance of 10.87 meters.

On the track, senior Reese Dragovich was fourth in the 800m run with a time of 2:11.16 and also teamed with Francesca Federici, Nicole Marshall and Megan Roberts to place fourth in the 4x400m relay in 3:53.84. The relay finish was part of a strong day for Marshall, who was the recipient of the G-MAC's Elite 26 Award for having the highest GPA among all athletes competing in the championship. Marshall is the first Hillsdale track and field athlete to win the award and joins Cecilia Guadalupi from women's swimming and diving and Jacob Meyer from men's basketball among Hillsdale recipients in all sports.

Junior Lucy Minning also had a big day for the Chargers, placing in three events. Minning took seventh in both the 100m dash (11.81) and 200m dash (24.74) for the Chargers, and she also teamed with Sarah Chappelle, Anna Lamoreaux, and Tara Townsend on the fourth-place 4x100m relay that finished in 47.41.

Chappelle was an individual placer for the Chargers as well, taking sixth in the 100m hurdles in 14.67. Josee Behling placed seventh in the 400m dash (57.25) and Nola Hipkins placed seventh in the 400m hurdles (1:05.91) as well for Hillsdale.

The Chargers finished with 135 points, good for third place behind extremely strong teams from host Ashland, who won the title with 209 points and runner-up Findlay with 168 points.

The G-MAC Championships in the rear view, Hillsdale now heads into last chance week looking to get as many athletes to the NCAA DII national meet as possible. While Hillsdale has several athletes who look safely in the field, like Parker, Townsend, and Allison Kuzma, several others will race multiple times over the next eight days looking to earn their way into the field. The action starts on Wednesday with Hillsdale's home Last Chance Meet, and will continue through Sunday. 

Photos Courtesy of Ashland Athletics