CHARLOTTESVILLE — Eastern Hancock junior Ellie Meyer has been a three-sport athlete for the Royals in her time at the school.
And as she gears up for her senior year, she’s reaching new heights in her respective sports.
In the fall, she returns as one of the volleyball team’s top hitters, in the winter she’ll go from bench role player to starter for the basketball team, and in the spring, she’ll return to cap off a track and field career that reached a new peak this past season.
“All of those sports just feed off of each other. My role on the basketball team is rebounding, getting up, and getting the ball, for volleyball, I’m a middle hitter, so I’m constantly jumping. There’s not a time where I’m on the ground for long,” Meyer said. “Track helps me stay in shape and really helps me hone in on those jumping mechanics and how I’m planting when I jump. They all just feed into each other.”
In her No. 1 sport — track and field — the Hancock County Girls Field Athlete of the Year has also reached new heights, literally.
At this year’s IHSAA Girls Track and Field State Finals, Meyer cleared 5-feet, 4-inches to place 12th in the high jump.
“I really didn’t do that well at regional so my seed wasn’t great, so to come back and place 12th, especially after placing 23rd last year was nice,” Meyer said. “My jump at 5-4 helped a ton because that was a big one that a lot of people got out on, and that was a height I had been struggling at all year long.”
A week earlier, at the Pike Regional, Meyer’s junior campaign seemed to come to an end after a fifth-place finish. With her height of 5-feet, 2-inches, she received a call back to return to Indiana University and the state finals for the second straight year.
“She kind of kept hitting a wall around 5-3 in competition, so it was up in the air if she was even going to be able to go to state,” Eastern Hancock head coach Josh Steele said. “It’s a testament to her dedication and frame of mind, that once she got that invitation, she was able to go out there and jump the best she had all season with the highest stakes. That event has a ton of strong competition, especially at the top end, so for her to go out and do better than she did last year and break through some of those barriers was really good to see. We were really proud and excited for her.”
The 12th-place finish was eight spots higher than her seed and 11 spots better than her 23rd-place finish as a sophomore. It was also the fourth-highest finish for an Eastern Hancock girl at state.
“I definitely felt a lot more relaxed this year. The weather was way nicer this year and it helped having [freshman hurdler] Bella [Sotelo] there and having more people around me. Having another teammate there was a really fun experience,” Meyer said. “It helped that I was more relaxed. Last year I was so tense and that really messed me up. This time, I had the mentality that there was nothing to lose. I was already at state. When I hit that height, it really boosted my self-esteem.”
Steele echoed that statement and attributes a good week of practice to Meyer’s state placement.
“I think she just understood where she was at. Part of it was that she had to wait for the callback, so she was able to center herself a little bit more than she had been able to. She had a great week of practice leading up to the event,” Steele said. “With the way the weather had been during the spring, her chances to actually get on the track and over the bar were few and far between. She just had that gratitude of getting the invite and knowing where she was at.”
Getting the callback and placing 12th made for a fitting ending to her season, but Meyer’s junior year had already been successful.
In the high jump, she took first place at the Pendleton Heights Sectional, first at the Mid-Eastern Conference Meet, first at the Eastern Hancock Invitational, second at the Hancock County Meet and second at the Guerin Catholic Invitational.
She helped the Royals win their first conference title since 2018 and along with her teammate, Sotelo, her individual sectional title was the first for an Eastern Hancock girl since 2017.
“When you know you’re getting 10 points from somebody consistently it helps keep everyone else on the team loose,” Steele said. “The way she stepped up and performed at the conference meet, and then her also running the relays for us and the 200 on top of the high jump really set that tone and that carried through the entire season.”
In those other events, Meyer was more than competitive.
At the conference meet, she placed second in the 200-meter dash and was part of both the winning 400 relay team and third-place 1600 relay team. At the Eastern Hancock Invitational, the relay teams placed second and third, in dual and tri meets throughout the year, Meyer took home an array of top finishes in all four of her main events, and against Richmond, she won the 400-meter for the first time.
“I do really like competing in those other events, especially the relays because I have teammates to back me up. High jump is one of those things that most of the time I can just get out of the way because it starts 15 or 30 minutes before the races anyways,” Meyer said. “High jump was my main focus, but not until the end of the season would I miss running practices just to focus on the high jump. Probably around conference and county I really started dialing in on the high jump.”
Competing all across the board and earning points in multiple events is just one of the many ways Meyer leads the Royals. With only two seniors on this year’s team, she also served as one of the team’s veteran leaders. As she enters next year, that leadership role will surely expand even more and so will her goals as a two-time state finalist and one of the most decorated track and field athletes in school history.
“She was great in that role. We didn’t have a ton of seniors, so she was one of the girls in a leadership role,” Steele said. “She connects really well with the team and is always able to step up and set an example for everybody else.”
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The Daily Reporter
2024 All-Hancock County
Girls Track and Field Team
Eastern Hancock: Megan Adkins, *Ellie Meyer, Kassie Peavler, *Bella Sotelo, Sydney Springman, Kaylee Swan, Clara Wallace
Greenfield-Central: Rachel Baker, Madelyn Bowman, Addison Buckley, Lexie Copeland, *Josie Kinnaman, *Savannah Lake, Brooklyn McConnell, Madelyn Mies, Ainsley Robinson, Jalyn Smith, Madison Sonsini, Gracie Spurling
Mt. Vernon: Londyn Floyd, *Emma Gale, *Emma Gasiorek, Brooklyn Harris, *Hannah Hauser, Laurel Hoeppner, Julia Iserloth, *Makenna Laffey, Marissa Miner, Ayana Moore, Elaina Moore, Lillian Quinn, Ani’ya Williams, Molly Worth
New Palestine: Margaret Barrett, Anne Bauer, Taylor Burke, McKenzie Hacker, *Rylee Hurst, Rebecca Johnson, *Abby Journay, Camille Massari, Amelia Stone, Taylor Stone, *Courtney Study
*State qualifier
Track Athlete of the Year: Bella Sotelo, Eastern Hancock
Field Athlete of the Year: Ellie Meyer, Eastern Hancock
Coach of the Year: Mark Foster, Greenfield-Central
