Over the last four months, Angelina Napoleon has become a different runner.

In February, she suffered an Achilles injury that limited her time on the track, but afforded her an unexpected opportunity to pursue a cross-training regimen and other speed- and strength-enhancing programs.

At this point, she was nearly a year removed from her first taste of the big time of NCAA Division I track and field. A month later, she turned 20, no longer the 18-year-old that had arrived in Raleigh, N.C. 18 months earlier, but an athletic specimen.

By late March, it seemed, she’d combined her new-found strength and increased stamina and experience with the confidence, unparalleled work ethic and innate ability that had always defined her.

Angelina Napoleon hurdles over the barrier during the 3000-meter steeplechase at the NCAA Eastern Regional in Jacksonville, Fla., on May 30. The N.C. State track standout finished second overall in 9:37.42 to qualify for her second-straight NCAA Outdoor Track and Field Championships, which will begin with Thursday’s semifinals.

With that, the Allegany native officially crossed the threshold from great to elite.

And that path has led her back to the mecca of competitive running: Eugene, Oregon.

Napoleon punched her ticket to a second-straight NCAA Outdoor Track and Field Championships with an impressive finish at the Eastern Regional on May 30. She’ll now be among the field of 24 competing in her marquee event, the women’s 3000-meter steeplechase, beginning with Thursday’s national semifinals (7:38 p.m. Eastern time, broadcasted live on ESPN) at the University of Oregon’s Hayward Field.

Unlike last June, however, when she was happy just to have qualified for the NCAA Championship as a true freshman, Napoleon will enter this year’s event with a real chance to reach the podium.

But how did she arrive at this point?

With one transcendent performance after another.

IN LATE March at the Raleigh Relays, the North Carolina State sophomore ran a 9:34.22 to finish first in the 3000-meter steeplechase.

In doing so, she not only shattered her personal-best time by 20 seconds, but established a new meet, facility and program record … all in her first outdoor meet of the season. That was as strong an indication as any that perhaps Napoleon had turned a competitive corner. And from there, she only continued to turn it.

On April 18, Napoleon broke her own school mark with a 9:29.20 en route to a third-place finish at the Wake Forest Invitational.

Her magnum opus, to date, however, came a month later in Winston-Salem, N.C.

ON THAT warm Friday night at the Atlantic Coast Conference Championships, the 2023 Allegany-Limestone graduate and former Gatorade National Track and Field Athlete of the Year didn’t just win, she dominated.

Napoleon led from start to finish – mostly by a wide margin – while claiming her first ACC title in a breathtaking time of 9:27.85. With this effort, she not only set the N.C. State program record for the third time, but she also shattered the ACC Outdoor Championship record by 13 seconds and earned First Team All-ACC honors.

Napoleon, who’d finished fourth in the 3000 steeplechase the year before, was dogged, determined and laser-focused on her goal from the beginning. And with her top competition, Notre Dame’s Sophie Novak, opting not to run, it was never a race — she beat No. 2 finisher Layla Roebke, of Louisville, by 27 seconds.

Two weeks later, the NCAA Eastern Regional at the University of North Florida (Jacksonville) amounted to a formality.

After entering the event ranked No. 2 in the East (behind the heavy favorite for this week’s national title, Alabama’s Doris Lemngole, an Olympic-caliber runner and reigning NCAA steeplechase champion who turned in a qualifying time of 9:13.12) and No. 4 nationally, Napoleon won her heat and placed second overall (behind Lemngole) in 9:37.42 to garner one of 12 qualifying spots for this week’s NCAA National Championships.

IN 2024, NAPOLEON, still only a freshman, was in the second tier of NCAA Championship steeplechase runners.

She finished 10th in her 12-woman heat.

A year later, though, she’s undoubtedly one of the best in the land, and now has two objectives (aside, of course, from potentially bringing home a title): Reaching the podium with a top-three finish or placing in the top eight overall, all of whom will be designated 2025 NCAA All-Americans.

And there’s every reason to believe she can achieve the former.

Napoleon still ranks No. 4 nationally in the steeplechase. Her fiercest competition for second place this week figures to be, among others, BYU’s Lexi Lowry-Halladay (9:23.03 QT), Northern Arizona’s Karrie Baloga (9:40.13), West Virginia’s Sarah Tait (9:42.14) and Texas A&M’s Debora Cherono (9:42.55).

The A-L graduate also ranks No. 60 in the world in the 3000 steeplechase, per worldathletics.org, and No. 14 among all United States runners, including pros. She’s also the youngest in the top 15 of the U.S. rankings, at just over 20 years old.

The NCAA Championship meet will feature two 12-runner semifinals slated for Thursday night on ESPN. The top five in each heat plus the next two-best times will move on to the national final.

If Napoleon advances, she will compete in that championship race, scheduled for 6:24 p.m. (Eastern) Saturday on ESPNU. Given the way she’s eclipsed herself in nearly every meet this spring, the new level she has hit toward the end of her sophomore campaign, Napoleon certainly seems to have positioned herself for a shot at the podium.