The Middlebury alpine team opened the NCAA Championships with the giant slalom (GS) on Wednesday from the Spencer F. Eccles Olympic Mountain Center in Park City, Utah. Colorado sits atop the leaderboard after the inital day of competition with 137 points. Utah follows closely behind with 134 points, while Montana State rounds out the top three with 109.5 points. The Panthers sit in fifth place, scoring 94 points. 

HIGHLIGHTS

• Nicholas Unkovskoy excelled in his second run, clocking the third-best time of 57.56 seconds to rise to the top spot with eight skiers remaining. When the final standings shook out, his combined effort of 1:56.10 put him in third place. His finish earned him All-American First-Team accolades.
• Kjersti Moritz paced the women's squad, completing her two trips down the mountain at 2:06.16 to claim sixth place and All-American Second-Team honors.
• During the women's race, Sophia Palmquist earned a share of 15th with a combined clocking of 2:08.00 alongside Cydnie Timmermann of Vermont.
• Competing on the NCAA stage for the first time, Milan Novak competed in the men's race and split 21st with Denver's Pietro Motterlini (1:57.84). Finishing nine-hundredths of a second behind was Julian Arthur for 23rd place.

NOTES

• Unkovskoy's podium effort marks the highest finish for a Panther male skier in the GS since Rob Cone '17 took home the national title at the 2015 NCAA Championships in Lake Placid, New York.
• Moritz becomes the first Middlebury female skier to earn All-American honors in their debut on the national stage since Ali Nullmeyer '23 tallied a sixth-place finish in the GS at the 2020 NCAA Championships in Bozeman, Montana.
• Kaite Fynn was 22nd after her initial run but didn't complete her second trip down the mountain.

The nordic squad opens competition on Thursday at the Soldier Hollow Nordic Center with the women's 7.5K classical individual start at 9:00 a.m. MT. Alpine is back in action on Friday with the slalom, which commences at 9:00 a.m. MT.