Wildcats Ntekpere selected as GNAC female athlete of the year

PORTLAND, Ore. — Emy Ntekpere’s 2025 track and field season at Central Washington University was nothing short of spectacular, according to a statement by Central Washington Athletics.

She broke records seemingly every time she competed, won three NCAA Division II national titles and was announced Thursday as the 2024-25 Great Northwest Athletic Conference Female Athlete of the Year, according to the statement.

She is the second woman and fourth student-athlete in school history to earn the top individual award from the conference and is the 12th women’s track and field athlete to receive the honor. Other CWU winners were LeAnne McGahuey (volleyball) in 2005-06, Mike Reilly (football) in 2008-09 and Johnny Spevak (football) in 2009-10.

Anyone who has followed GNAC track & field has seen this coming since Ntekpere debuted as a freshman in 2023-24, as she just missed the podium at both the indoor and outdoor national championships, CWU wrote in the statement.

A year later, Ntekpere grew into the preeminent jumper in Division II. After claiming the gold medals in both the high jump and triple jump at the 2025 NCAA Outdoor Track and Field Championships, she was named the United States Track & Field and Cross-Country Coaches Association National Field Athlete of the Year.

Ntekpere’s first national title came during the indoor campaign, when she broke the conference indoor record with a jump of 42 feet, 8 inches (13.0 meters) on her fourth attempt March 14 in Indianapolis. The competition wasn’t close among the field of 18 jumpers, with Pittsburg State’s Auna Childress finishing a distant second at 41 feet, 11.5 inches (12.79 meters).

Ntekpere’s second- and third-best jumps also would have won her the national championship. She doubled down as an All-American in the high jump, clearing 5-10 feet (1.78 meters) to finish in sixth place. That mark was also a GNAC indoor all-time record.

The sophomore’s success on the national stage came after a dominant performance at the GNAC Indoor Championships, where she won gold in both the long jump and triple jump, took bronze in the high jump and placed fifth in the 60-meter hurdles.

Ntekpere’s long jump of 19-3.25 feet (5.87 meters) was fourth-best in GNAC indoor history, and her 30 points scored were the most of any athlete at the meet. She was named the GNAC Field Athlete of the Meet and the GNAC Indoor Field Athlete of the Year.

Ntekpere quickly got to work on the outdoor record books, breaking the GNAC records in the triple jump at 43-6 feet (13.26 meters) and high jump at 5 feet, 10.5 inches (1.79 meters) and posting the 10th-best long jump at 19 feet 4.75 inches (5.91 meters) in her first meet of the campaign.

She didn’t stop there, as the GNAC Outdoor Championships provided her with an opportunity to achieve something that had never been done since the league was founded in 2001-02. Competing in her second multi-event as a collegiate athlete, Ntekpere racked up 4,768 points in the heptathlon to secure the gold medal. She won four of the seven events to pick up her first 10 points in the championship.

She then became the first-ever athlete to sweep all three jump events at a GNAC Championship, taking gold in the high jump, long jump and triple jump on May 9-10 in Bellingham. By the time the dust settled, Ntekpere had earned her team 40 points and became the first woman in GNAC history to win four individual gold medals at a single GNAC Championship.

She became just the fifth woman in conference history to reach 40 points at a single championship event and upped her two-year total to 68 points at the outdoor championships. That is already tied for the 20th-most outdoor championship points in a collegiate career, with the record of 115 points being jointly held by Seattle Pacific’s Ali Worthen (2011-13) and current GNAC Commissioner Bridget Johnson, who competed at Western Oregon (2003-06).

Ntekpere’s outdoor national championship performance began much like her indoor one did, but she faced stern competition in her specialty event of the triple jump. She got off to a stellar start at 13.24 meters on her first attempt and 13.26 meters on her third attempt to move to the top of the leaderboard. But Mount Olive freshman Janara Bryant turned up the heat on her fifth attempt, with a monster jump of 13.27 meters to move into the lead.

With just one attempt remaining and a national title hanging in the balance, Ntekpere showed her elite mental and physical toughness as she cleared 43-9 feet (13.33 meters) to snatch back the gold medal. It was the first-ever outdoor national title for a GNAC women’s triple jumper and just the fourth-ever All-America performance the league has seen in the event.

Ntekpere wasn’t finished there, as she also leapt her way to gold in the high jump. Only she and Lee’s Liezl Theron advanced past the 1.79-meter bar, and on her second attempt Ntekpere simultaneously broke her own conference record and secured the national crown.

Theron fouled on all three attempts at 5 feet, 11.5 inches (1.82 meters). Ntekpere wound up scoring 20 of Central Washington’s 31 points, as she played an instrumental role in the Wildcats finishing seventh among 71 women’s track and field programs at the national meet.

It was the best-ever team finish for CWU, topping a 20th-place performance in 2019. It was also tied for the third-best women’s team finish in conference history and was the best women’s team finish since Alaska Anchorage placed seventh at the 2019 national meet.

The GNAC Athlete of the Year award is presented annually to one male and one female deemed to have achieved the highest performance athletically. The awards are voted upon by the conference’s athletic directors.