Colonel Crawford girls win fifth consecutive N10 title, boys runner up to Seneca East
BUCYRUS — The Northern 10 runs through Colonel Crawford.
Friday night, the girls won their fifth consecutive track title and eighth in nine seasons since the league began in 2014-15. Of the 17 events, Crawford won 12, finished second and third in the mile and two mile, second in the 100-meter hurdles, and fourth in discus — shot put was the lowest finish (seventh) but still managed to score points.
"The girls are running really well right now," coach Preston Foy said. "We've been pushing pretty hard. We're not ready to taper some of those girls yet because there's some that we think that could get down to state. I think the girls are really excited about the postseason right now and they felt confident, obviously, coming into N10 today."
At a program like Colonel Crawford, league is the final warmup before the real trek begins.
"I think they're really excited to start the journey to state," Foy said. "And they know what it takes because we have a lot of girls back that have been to state."
The Eagles swept the sprints with Hailey Slagle in the 100-meter dash (12.70), Ayla McKibben in a photo finish 200-meter dash (27.20) — Upper Sandusky's Jocelyn Leightey was nine-hundredths of a second behind and Slagle was only seven-hundredths behind her — and Olivia Hardy in the 400-meter dash (1:01.67).
Cecelia Chase won the half-mile (2:25.15) and broke the meet record in the 1600-meter run — but was bested by another record-breaking performance from Seneca East's Lilly Schiefer — while teammate Rylinn Edgington was third, then second in the two-mile with Brynn Bruner right behind. Mira Holt won the 300-meter hurdles (50.33) and was second in the 100-meter hurdles.
All four relays swept with the 4x800 setting a new meet record with a 9:51.85, almost a full 25 seconds quicker than runner-up Seneca East. Niyah Shipman won the high jump (4-10), Gabby Roston won pole vault (11-00) and Holt was first in the long jump (15-09⅟₄).
"We tried to beef up the schedule up a little bit," Foy said. "The (Galion) Kiwanis meet last week was a little bit of a wake-up call because I don't think we won an event there in the relays. The (Mansfield) Mehock we try to use it as a way to run and get good looks at things.
"This is a very experienced girls team which is why they ran so well today at N10."
And the boys battled but came up 43 points short against the now four-time defending champs.
"Seneca East is just so deep and their distance is phenomenal, that was really the main difference," Foy said. "We thought we could hang with them in the sprints and hurdles, but the distance was the difference. They just ran away from us, and everybody else, in the distance."
The Tigers were second and third in the half-mile behind Colonel Crawford's Adam Scott (2:03.29), along with winning the 4x800 relay and going 1-2 in the mile and two-mile — that was 50 of their points just in distance.
"The boys really competed and did some good things," Foy said. "We have a lot of young guys like Roen Thew and John Degray being freshmen scoring in events. Luke Christman got third of discus. So seeing young kids like that perform this hard to compete … they did a good job."
Thew was third in the 110-meter hurdles with teammate Trevor Vogt setting a new meet record with a time of 14.88, then Vogt and Thew were first and second in the 300-meter hurdles.
"It's huge, experience is huge," Foy said of his freshmen. "You try to prepare them and tell them what to expect, but until you get out there and actually do it, you don't understand. Even Trevor struggled as a freshman and sophomore at conference, so until you really get out there and see what it's about, you don't really know.
"Hopefully this will build for the future."
Lucky for the boys, they don't have to look far to see what it takes. And they have a fresh start with the Division III district meet on Wednesday.
"The girls know what's out there," Foy said. "They know what is going to be at regionals when they get there, and that kind of goes back to experience. While on the boys side, it's a younger team and they're gonna have to learn from this.
"Hopefully they can be like the girls here in a couple years."
Other notable results
Bucyrus' Eli Sprague set a new meet record in the 400-meter dash running a 51.02, one of just two meet records broken on the boys side. His team finished fourth with 80 points.
Wynford boys were sixth with 47.50, Buckeye Central seventh at 37.50. And on the girls side Wynford (46.50) was fifth, Buckeye Central (38) sixth and Bucyrus (12) eighth.
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This article originally appeared on Bucyrus Telegraph-Forum: Colonel Crawford girls win fifth straight Northern 10 track title
