Prospect shuts door on Bruce Ritter team title winning the 4x400 Meter Relay

By Michael Newman

Downers Grove, Ill – The team title at the Bruce Ritter Invitational held at Downers Grove North High School Thursday evening was pretty much decided with the host Trojans and the defending Class 3A Girls champion Prospect as the two teams were separated by 1.5 points remaining including the 4x400 Meter Relay.

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The Knights made short work in the 4x400 Meter Relay having a solid lead halfway through the event and rolled to a win timed at 3:57.30 with Dajana Skolimowska, Mary Laba, Ireland Wildhart, and Nikki Niebrugge part of that quartet with Downers Grove North (4:05.59) and Glenbard West (4:09.36) finishing second and third.

Prospect won with 139 points winning all four varsity relays along with four individual wins on the track. Downers Grove North scored 132.5 points to finish second with the closest school to them Shepard scoring 60 points to finish third ahead of Palatine (56.5 points) and York (54.5 points).

There were two athletes that won two individual events with one of them coming from Prospect. Amina Hadziahmetovic, was part of two relay wins, chipped in with two individual wins in this meet. Hadziahmetovic ran 12.69 to hold off York’s Jillian Booth to win the 100 Meter Dash. Booth was a close second timed at 12.72 with the race run into a strong headwind. Hadziahmetovic had a little more distance in her win in the 200 Meter Dash timed in 25.32 with Allison Leach of Downers Grove North finishing second (26.11).

Kyla Motley of Shepard had a good meet winning a field event and one race on the track. Motley jumped 18-5.75 to win the Long Jump by over a foot with Palatine’s Aisha Kazeem of Palatine jumping 17-2.75 to place second. The two athletes faced off again in the 100 Meter Hurdles which again was run into a headwind. The two were even over the final hurdle with Motley getting the win (15.36) ahead of Kazeem four hundredths of a second back (15.40). Kazeem, the defending Class 3A champion in the 300 Meter Hurdles, ruled that event by running 46.26 for the win.

Prospect three relay wins had performances that are among the top five performances in the state (as of 4/18/2025). Their team in the 4x800 Meter Relay quartet was pushed by Glenbard West throughout the relay led by a 2:16.9 opening leg from Meg Peterson. Ireland Wildhart and Sophie Franzen stayed close to Glenbard West’s Maia Kaslewicz and Mackenzie Gilbert getting the baton to Prospect’s Veronica Znajda to run the final 800-meters. Znajda ran a 2:21 anchor split to lead the Knights to the fastest time in the state (9:25.54) with Glenbard West finishing second timed at 9:30.51 (IL #4).

Peterson’s race with Naperville Central’s Lola Satre-Morales in the 800 Meter Run was perhaps the highlight race of the meet. The two runners went through the first of two laps in 57.9. Satre-Morales started to pull away on the backstretch with Peterson responding heading into the final curve. The two were side by side each runner testing each other’s mettle as they closed in on the finish line. Peterson found one more gear than Satre-Morales as the two turned in the fastest two times in the state. Peterson ran 2:13.51 for the win with Satre-Morales (2:13.69) placing second. Mary Laba of Prospect running 2:14.73 (IL #6) to place second.

Prospect missed their season’s best just by three hundredths of a second slower than they ran at the Oregon Relays two weeks ago. The team of Hadziahmetovic, Anna Niebrugge, Samantha Skowronski, and Nikki Niebrugge ran 47.07 to win by over two seconds ahead of Downers Grove North (49.54) and York (49.81). The quartet of the same four runners in the 4x1 for Prospect were even more impressive in the 4x200 Meter Relay running 1:39.82 (IL #2) for a new meet record and the win ahead of Downers Grove North (1:46.44) and West Aurora (1:46.86).

Dajana Skolimowska gave Prospect one of their event wins running a fast 57.38 (IL #3) to win the 400 Meter Dash. Alyssa Garcia of Hampshire (59.16) and Morgan Navarre of York (59.26) were the only other runners that ran under 60 seconds.

Other Meet Highlights

Macy Ermitage of Downers Grove North broke away from a pack of three other runners in the final two laps. The freshman ran 73 seconds in the closing lap to run a personal best of 10:57.66 to win the 3200 Meter Run. Teammate Audrey Casten ran 11:15.31 to finish second holding off Palatine’s Abigail Jordan (11:20.26) and Elizabeth Garrett (11:20.94). Karlin Janowski of York ran 11:22.76 in placing fifth.

Alexa Novak of Glenbard West and Veronica Znajda broke away from the field just before 800-meters in the 1600 Meter Run. Novak pulled away from Znajda in the final 500-meters and held on to run 5:02.92 to claim the win with Znajda running 5:04.99 to finish second. Alayna Todnem of Downers Grove North ran 5:15.87 to finish second with York’s Soffia Stoddard running 5:18.16 to finish fourth.

Maliyah Coleman of Thornton had a best put of 34-4.25 to edge Rylie Marshall of Downers Grove North (34-1.25) to win the Shot Put. Lia Paribello of Oswego East threw a personal best of 109-9 to win the Discus. Sophia Solecki of Downers Grove North threw 101-4 to finish second.

Kennedi Reed of Naperville Central jumped 37-3.25, a personal best, in winning the Triple Jump. Kyla Motley jumped 36-9.75 to place second. Maya Nicholson of Downers Grove North cleared 5-1.75 to win the High Jump. Leigh Ferrell of Lyons Township and Brooke Neri of Prospect both cleared 11-0 in the Pole Vault. Ferrell won the event on fewer misses.

Glenbard West ran 4:11.28 to hold off Shepard (4:11.33) to win the Frosh/Soph 4x400 Meter Relay. Prospect ran 4:11.76 to finish third.