The women’s track and field team made its debut in 1977, competing in both indoor and outdoor seasons. Jana Shipley was head coach of the Battling Bishops’ women’s track & field team from 1980-85. She led the Bishops to the first North Coast Athletic Conference indoor track & field championship in 1985 as well as multiple state titles in the Ohio Association of Intercollegiate Sports for Women (OAISW) in the years before Ohio Wesleyan women’s teams were affiliated with an athletic conference.
In 1990, Juli Althoff ’91 placed third in the indoor high jump at the National Collegiate Athletic Association Division III championship meet to become Ohio Wesleyan’s first female two-sport All-American. Althoff finished third in the outdoor high jump and earned GTE Academic All-America laurels the following year.
The women’s track & field team won both the NCAC indoor and outdoor championships in 2007. The indoor title was Ohio Wesleyan’s first since 1994. It was the first time since 1991 that Ohio Wesleyan swept both women’s indoor and outdoor track & field titles.
In 2009, the men’s and women’s track & field teams each won the NCAC indoor and outdoor championships, marking the first time that both Ohio Wesleyan men’s and women’s teams have won both indoor and outdoor conference titles in the same year. In 2010, the men’s and women’s track & field teams each win the NCAC indoor championships, with the women’s team extending its string of consecutive conference crowns to four. Cara DeAngelis ’14 won All-America honors in the 5000-meter run in 2014. Earlier, the women’s track & field team won its eighth consecutive NCAC indoor title.
The Battling Bishop men and women’s track teams host indoor meets in the Gordon Field House, which is nestled in the middle of the Ohio Wesleyan campus. Gordon Field House was named in recognition of the gift of Richard Gordon ’62, a standout tennis player for the Battling Bishops.
The field house received a new roof, new floor, new lighting and a brightened interior in November 2008, and the track was refinished with a state-of-the-art encapsulated surface in December 2008. Gordon Field House annually hosted the Ohio Athletic Conference championships and the OAISW state title meet and was the site of the first nine NCAC championship meets.
