The Milwaukee women’s track and field team finished as runners-up at the Horizon League Outdoor Championship, according to a May 10 announcement. The Panthers totaled 163.5 points over three days, narrowly missing first place by just 8.5 points behind Youngstown State’s winning total of 172.
This close finish marks the slimmest margin for Milwaukee at the Horizon League Women’s Outdoor Championships since 2015. The event highlights the team’s competitiveness in NCAA Division I athletics and their ongoing presence in both indoor and outdoor competitions throughout the season, according to the official website.
Head coach Andrew Basler said, “I couldn’t be more proud of our team for how they closed out the championships today. On the outside, people will see the women had a lead going into today and fell short. But on paper, we were projected to fall short by 50 points. Our ladies stepped up today and swung a lot of points in our favor.” Basler also praised individual performances: “Emma had a monster win in the pole vault, an event that swung 20 points in our favor…our hurdlers came up big in the 100-meter hurdles to claim 17 team points…these ladies have nothing to hang their head for.”
Milwaukee earned two post-meet specialty awards: Kallie Volk was named Women’s Championship Outstanding Performer/Field, while Nevia Levenhagen secured Women’s Freshman of the Year/Field honors. In jumping events alone, Milwaukee collected a total of 79.5 points across long jump, triple jump, high jump, and pole vault categories.
Individual highlights included Anna Szepieniec winning triple jump with a leap of 12.13 meters—a mark that now ranks tenth all-time for Milwaukee—and Emma Johnson capturing pole vault gold with a career-best height of 3.92 meters (fourth-best in program history). Additional podium finishes came from Adaline Powell (third) and Volk (fourth) in triple jump; Olivia VanZeeland was runner-up in high jump; Victoria Spagnola placed third in both hurdles events; Katie Burns took third place finishes in both sprint events; Nolie Anderson led hammer throw efforts with eighth place.
Basler challenged his athletes prior to competition: “I challenged the team on Thursday night to go into this weekend without leaving anything undone,” he said. “Not their effort. Not their support of each other…They did a great job leaving everything out there for each other.” He concluded by acknowledging his coaching staff—Schultz, Hatch, Howard, Schmidt, Rogalski, Campbell and Johnson—and stated: “We will now turn our attention to growing the group of athletes who already achieved marks that will get them to the NCAA West Prelims.”
The Panthers’ next meet is scheduled at UW-La Crosse Final Qualifier on Thursday at Veterans Memorial Field Sports Complex.
The Milwaukee Panthers women’s track and field team bolsters athletic legacy at University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee as part of Horizon League competition while assisting student-athletes with balancing academic responsibilities alongside athletics within Milwaukee itself—according to information from their official website.
