The Milan News-Leader
A Heritage Newspaper
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Big Red track teams split duals with SMCC
Girls battle into last event, while boys dominate sprints
By Jerry Hinnen, Staff Writer
PUBLISHED: May 10, 2007
In two straight dual meets, the Milan girls' track team went into the final event of the meet with the outcome hanging in the balance.
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The Big Reds won that event, the 1600-meter relay, to edge Riverview by two April 24. But the Big Reds weren't as fortunate against St. Mary Catholic Central May 3, coming in second in the relay and falling 66-62.
"It's disappointing," said head coach Steve Porter, "but a couple of weeks ago, I wouldn't have expected us to have even been this close. Our girls had some good performances and can hold their heads high. We've come a long way in just those couple of weeks."
While the Milan girls slipped to 2-1 in their dual meet slate, the boys' team improved its record to 3-0 with a 77-51 win over the Falcons.
"We're not bad," said boys' coach Rich Pellegrini. "We've got good sprinters, we've seen real improvement from our distance runners, our jumps look good ... We're not bad."
The Big Reds got another big performance from newcomer Ron Spears, who won the 100 dash (10.95) and 200 dash (23.08) and was joined by Cedric Douglas, Kyle Love and Anthony Marshall in winning the first-place 400 relay (44.08).
Spears also set a new personal best of 21'4 1/2" in winning the long jump, more than a foot ahead of second-place Leo Gabrielzyk.
"He's got great pop and great speed," Pellegrini said of Spears. "The thing is, he's still only running about 80 percent when he hits the board. I could see him getting up to 22 to 23 feet."
Milan excelled in the other field events as well, with Jake Hill (43'7 1/2"), David Box and Scott Kenyon sweeping the shot put; Box winning the discus (116'9"); and Eric Betts winning the high jump at 6'2".
Milan won three of the four relays with Douglas, Gabrielzyk, Love and Marshall taking the 800 (1:33.54) and Eric Myyra, Sam Rowe, Matt Chapin and Gabrielzyk the 1,600 (3:51.94), in addition to the 400 win.
Gabrielzyk scored Milan's other first-place finish in the 400 dash, running 53.28. Rowe (54.44) placed third in the event.
Other key performers included Kyle Anderson, who finished second in both the 1,600 (4:50.98) and 3,200 (10:36.78); Eric Myyra (2:08.02) and Brian Kirkpatrick (2:08.65), who took second and third in the 800; Kyle Love, second place in the 300 hurdles; and Marshall, "just a step behind" Spears in Pellegrini's words, who cemented Milan's sprint domination with second-place finishes in the 100 (11.04) and 200 (23.53) dashes.
The Big Red girls once again rode the performances of senior distance runner Emily Wilson, winner of the 800 (2:30.22) and 1,600 (5:26.52) and anchor for the second-place 3,200 relay team (11:13.84), also featuring Kara Porter, Jordan Tomecek and Tiffany Stoddard.
Running the same slate of events against Riverview, Wilson had had enough gas in the tank to win the 3,200 (the meet's next-to-last event) as well, but it didn't work out against SMCC. Wilson ran 12:19.82 and finished third, with SMCC in first and Tomecek (12:06.30) in second.
"She's carried the team at a couple of other meets, winning event after event after event," Porter said of Wilson. "She's very intense. There are times you want her to hold off a bit, to save something for her next event. But that's not her style. She goes all out every race."
Wilson was far from the only Big Red to impress on the track against SMCC, however. Ashley Agar won both the 100 (17.75) and 300 hurdles (52.51), and ran for the first-place 800 relay (1:59.38) with Mareisha Lala, Remina Reed and Angela Swain. Reed (1:07.41) and Lala (1:07.46) also went 2-3 in the 400 dash, with Reed (13.54) adding a third in the 100 dash and Swain (30.50) a third in the 200 dash. Tomecek (5:38.13) finished third in the 1,600.
But where Milan shined was in the field events. The Big Reds outscored SMCC 17-1 in the throws, with Stephanie Kanitz (89'8"), Jennifer Terry and Megan Bailey sweeping the discus, and Kanitz (31'4 1/2") and Kai Beverly finishing 1-2 in the shot put. Loren Weber won the high jump at 4'8", with Eryn Jacobs in third, and Courtney Trudeau (13'3 1/2") placed second in the long jump.
"That was a pleasant surprise," Porter said. "Usually, we come out of the field events behind. Today, we came out ahead. They scored a lot of points for us."
Ryan Dombrowski, Lance Smith, Chapin, Jeremy Chie, Bill Egolf, John Nuckles, Josh Martin, Randy Butts, Cory Iott, Sean Domas, Myles Martin, Anthony Durbin, Gabrielzyk, Rowe, Love, Box, Betts, Anderson, Spears, Marshall and Douglas posted season-best performances against SMCC.
Staff Writer Jerry Hinnen can be reached at 429-7380 or at jhinnen@heritage.com.
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