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06/29/2017 12:00 AMEmily Maffeo’s tenure with the East Haven track program came to a close when she graduated in 2016, although her career was far from finished. Emily went on to compete for Southern Connecticut State University (SCSU) this year and posted some fantastic numbers as a freshman.
The possibility of running in college didn’t cross Emily’s mind until she was a senior at East Haven, when SCSU Head Coach Melissa Stoll asked Yellowjackets’ Coach Rusty Dunne about her.
“I didn’t even know I was running in college until the Southern coach came to our state meet and asked Coach Dunne about me,” says Emily. “[Coach Dunne] told me he had faith in me, and that I could do it. I’m so happy I made the decision to run in college.”
Emily saw immediate success at Southern, and a lot of it stemmed from all of her extra effort. Emily notes now much more intense the workouts and training are at the collegiate level.
“It’s a big change. I’m at practice for about three hours a day. I’m lifting on top of all my running workouts,” Emily says. “They’re more intense, and I never did half of this stuff in high school. The workouts gave me the strength I need, and I ended up dropping times in all my events. I never thought I’d be able to do that.”
Coach Dunne is happy that Emily decided to join SCSU’s track program and even happier that she did so well right out of the starting gate.
“The great thing about Emily is that she was recruited late, and she’s the one that decided that she wanted to do this and make it work,” says Dunne. “We made the change her junior year to make her a 400 runner from a distance runner, and it should’ve been done long before that. She really prospered, and we’re so proud of her.”
Emily welcomed the move to the 400-meter dash. While it wasn’t easy learning to how to start a race on the blocks, Emily got used to it, and says she loves how she doesn’t have to pace herself and can go into a full sprint right away.
Thus far at Southern, Emily has set personal-record marks in the 200-meter dash with a time of 26.89 seconds, along with the 400 (58.26) and the 500 (1:16.89). She’s also contributed to some solid times in the 4x100, 4x400, and 4x800 relays.
“I dropped my times dramatically. Every meet, I feel like I’m dropping seconds. It feels really good, because I never thought I’d be where I am now,” says Emily. “For the 500, I’m about two seconds off Southern’s school record, so I’m trying to aim for that.”
Speaking of records, Emily was part of six school records at East Haven upon graduating. For the indoor team, Emily held the 400 record at 64.80 seconds and ran on the school record 4x200, 4x400, and 1,600 sprint medley relay teams. In the 4x200, Emily ran with Megan Kikosicki, Hailey Onorato, and Annie Coleman, who set the school mark at 1:50.89. In the 4x400, Emily, Kikosicki, Onorato, and her sister Katie Maffeo posted a record mark of 4:23.81. For the sprint medley, the group of Kikosicki, Coleman, Emily, and Katie Maffeo ran a time of 4:33.82.
During the outdoor season, Emily was part of the record-setting 4x400 relay with Haley Montesanto and her sisters Katie and Paige Maffeo (4:19.68), as well as the distance medley relay. She also set the school record for the 5K. Emily’s favorite of the bunch was the outdoor 4x400 relay, because she got to contribute to a record, while competing alongside two of her three sisters.
“One of my best experiences was when Coach Dunne put me, my two sisters Katie and Paige, in the 4x4 relay with Haley. We just threw the team together, but we ended up breaking the school record,” says Emily, who was a captain for the Yellowjackets’ outdoor track squad, as well as their girls’ cross country team. “We had never all run together before, but we did really well, and went to SCCs and states.”
Emily enjoyed a great running career with the Yellowjackets, but now she’s on to new horizons at Southern Connecticut. On the heels of her great freshman year, Emily can’t wait to get started to try and better her personal records during her sophomore season with the Owls.
“I’m so excited to go back,” she says. “We got our summer workouts, and I’m starting that now, so I can better myself, because I want to drop my times even more.”