By Brennan Stebbins (For OzarksSportsZone.com)
Daniel Lewis, the College Heights Christian track and field coach, said distance running has traditionally been the Cougars’ strength.
But on Friday at the Inch at a Time Track Classic in Sarcoxie, Lewis’ squad showed off its new strengths. The Cougars excelled in the jumps and won three events overall while scoring in 13 of 19 events to come away with a first-place finish.
“In the past it’s really been distance runners that have been our strength, but now we’re stacked with sprinters and especially jumpers,” Lewis said. “It’s the jumps that won the meet for us. The points we scored in the high jump, triple jump and long jump made the difference for us for sure.”
The Cougars still needed some late heroics on the track to fend off Seneca’s boys. The two teams were tied with 92 points going into the 4×400 relay, the final event of the night, but College Heights’ crew of Colsen Dickens, Levi Durling, Caleb Quade and Ethan Ukena won the relay in 3:40.83, while Seneca’s group finished in fifth.
College Heights took the first two spots in the long jump and scored 20 points total in the event with Logan Decker (6.33 meters) earning first place, Caleb Quade following in second and Derek Bowman finishing seventh.
Quade won the triple jump with a distance of 12.80 meters, and the Cougars got seven points out of the high jump, where Decker was fourth and Quade seventh.
“We felt we had a decent chance because we have a good spread of kids,” Lewis said. “We’re scoring in multiple events. We’ve got one distance runner bringing in some points and of course our sprint relays and our sprints and our jumps all scoring points. We felt pretty good coming in that we had a shot and the kids did what they were supposed to do. We had three PR’s today and that’s what you’re looking for this time of the season.”
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Two of those season-best times came in the 4×100 and 4×200 relays, where College Heights finished second in each. In the 4×100 it was Bowman, Decker, Colsen Dickens and Levi Durling, and in the 4×200 it was Decker, Bowman, Durling and Ukena. Those races provided another 16 points.
The other PR was Colton McMillan in the 1600; he placed third to score six points.
Durling placed fourth in the 100-meter dash, Ukena placed second in the 400, Zach Beaty was sixth in the 800, McMillan finished third in the 3200, and Steven Calandro took fourth in the 100 hurdles and third in the 300 hurdles.
Despite the second-place finish, Seneca only finished first in one event: the 200-meter dash, where Blake Hurn won in 23.61 seconds.
Sarcoxie and Hollister each won four events. For the host Bears, Antonio Benito won the 100-meter dash in 11.60 seconds; Gatlon Malotte won the pole vault at 3.65 meters; the 4×100 relay of Blake Heckmaster, Benito, Garrett Smith and Noah Garrison won in 44.09 seconds; and the 4×200 relay of Benito, Garrison, Smith and Heckmaster won in 1:33.31.
Sinry Mendoza provided two of Hollister’s wins: he won the 400 in 52.70 seconds and the 3200 in 9:59, despite the stadium lights shutting off midway through the race––the runners finished the event in the dark. And Noah Richardson provided the two others; he won the shot put at 13.55 meters and the discus throw with a distance of 44.68 meters.
McAuley’s Michael Parrigon had a hand in winning three events. He won the 800 (2:05.92) and 1600 (4:43.50) on his own, and teamed up with Trae Veer, Connor Taffner and Alex Bohachick to capture the 4×800 relay in 8:46.35.
Diamond’s Zachary Roughton won the 110 hurdles (15.93 seconds) and the 300 hurdles (41.36).
Galena’s Wyatt Doak won the high jump at 1.88 meters, and Sherwood’s Luke Mainard was tops in the javelin at 46.26 meters.
Pierce City girls continue their roll
Pierce City’s girls squad earned its third victory in six meets on Friday, and it was another convincing win for the Eagles, who also have a pair of second-place finishes on the year.
The Eagles won four events at Sarcoxie and scored in 16 of them.
Liliana Lasker turned in a season-best time of 1:02.88 in winning the 400-meter dash, and Emma Hunt added two first-place finishes: she won the 1600 in 5:46.09 and the 3200 in 12:25.18. And the Eagles’ other win came in the triple jump, where Paige Fenske reached a distance of 10.48 meters.
Lasker scored six more points by placing third in the 100-meter dash, and three more points with a sixth-place finish in the 200. Ginger Leavitt earned a point by placing eighth in the 800, and Lauren Blackburn scored a total of eight points by placing seventh in the 1600 and third in the 3200. Addison Avondet, with fourth-place finishes in the 100 hurdles and 300 hurdles, added 10 points to the total.
The Eagles totaled 14 points in the pole vault with Fenske taking third, Sara Witt finishing fourth and Pacience Lee placing fifth. Fenske scored eight by placing second in the long jump, and Jaelee Mettlach finished seventh for two more points. Elizabeth Sharp scored six (third place) in the discus, and Ginger Leavitt scored two (seventh place) in the triple jump.
Pierce City also scored 23 points in the relays. Fenske, Witt, Avondet and Lasker earned fourth in the 4×100. Laira Jones, Lexie Jones, Mettlach and Witt finished fifth in the 4×200. In the 4×400, Fenske, Laira Jones, Lexie Jones and Mettlach placed third. And, with a season’s best time, Blackburn, Laira Jones, Leavitt and Hunt earned second in the 4×800.
Seneca and Sherwood’s girls squads each won three events. For the Indians, the 4×100 relay of Grace Elliott, Addyson Jones, Anna Adkins and Savannah Johnson won 53.99 seconds; the 4×200 relay of Johnson, Jones, Adkins and Cambry Long won in 1:51.97; and Isabella Renfro was tops by a wide margin in the shot put with a distance of 11.56 meters.
Sherwood’s Sadie McCulloh earned all three wins for the Lady Marksmen. She won the 200 (27.40), the 100 hurdles (15.84) and the 300 hurdles (49.64).
Galena’s Jasmine Temich won the 100-meter dash in 13.46 seconds and Kaesha Walter won the high jump at 1.47 meters.
Skyline’s Kadence Wallace took first in the 800 with a time of 2:36.85, and Ashlen Garrett won the pole vault at 2.90 meters.
For Thomas Jefferson, the 4×400 relay of Kirra Moser, Haley Orr, Presley Long and Emmanuelle Sweeny was first in 4:35.96, and Lannah Grigg easily won the discus throw with a distance of 32.24 meters.
Host Sarcoxie’s highlight was the 4×800 relay, with Laney Dorris, Lily Garrison, Andela Hirtz and Sophie Wagner finishing in 11:09.26 to win by more than seven seconds.
Crane’s Lily Woodward won the long jump at 4.83 meters, and Miller’s Leah Bowles won the javelin throw at 27.88 meters.
Boys team scores
College Heights 102
Seneca 97
Sarcoxie 88
Hollister 70
McAuley 51
Diamond 49
Lamar 46
Skyline 39
Crane 38
Lockwood 37
Sherwood 33.50
Thomas Jefferson 33
Pierce City 24.50
Galena 17
Miller 13
Purdy 3
Girls team scores
Pierce City 123
Thomas Jefferson 94.50
Seneca 83
Sherwood 76
Sarcoxie 53
Crane 52
Miller 50
Skyline 47
Galena 42.50
Diamond 29
McAuley 23
Lockwood 22
Hollister 19
College Heights 9
Lamar 6
Exeter 2
El Dorado Christian 1
Fordland 1
