Malloy, Coker and Yoder among regional standouts

GOSHEN — Elkhart's Max Malloy collapsed on the infield and stayed down for several minutes.

He got up and quickly shook off a fourth place finish in the 3,200 and wanted some ice cream to end his day at the Goshen Regional.

Malloy still had reasons to celebrate after his performances in the 3,200 relay and 1,600. The Lions junior finished second in the 1,600 with a time of 4:17.81 and ran the anchor leg on the 3,200 relay, which finished first with regional record time of 7:55.94.

Malloy next meet will be at the state finals next Saturday at Indiana University.

The top three finishers in each event at the regional, along with others that meet the 3 Participant Standard will advance to the state finals.

"This week I just wanted to give myself a chance to compete next week," said Malloy. "I just wanted to go out there and get a couple medals and I accomplished that goal. I didn't make (state) in all three events this year, but the guys as a whole (at the regional) really improved this year. That made things more difficult, but it was still a lot of fun today."

Max Huckleberry, Jackson Ezell and Aaron Richter joined Malloy on the record-breaking 3,200 relay.

"Baylor Miller (from Northridge) took the lead and I kind of sat on him for the first lap and then all that I remember is that at the 500-meter mark I kind of took the lead there and never looked back," Malloy said.

"I was looking at the clock (on the scoreboard) because I heard my teammates screaming. We were one second off the school-record. I was really going for that, but we didn't get it."

The most successful athlete at the meet was Penn's Elijah Coker, who was a four-time winner. Those events were the 400 relay, 200, 1,600 relay and long jump. School records were broke in the long jump, 200 and 400 relay.

"This means everything," said Coker. "I left everything out there on the track. I love this team. I'm just excited to be able to compete with such a great group."

In the final running event, Coker ran the anchor leg on the 1,600 relay, which edged out Northridge. The Kingsmen finished with a time of 3:23.22 and the Raiders finished with a time of 3:23.43.

"We didn't have the best hand-off," Coker said about the baton exchange between him and the third leg. "I was a little rusty. I knew I made a mistake and took off a little early, so I knew I had to definitely push and win the race for my team."

Last year, Coker made it to state in the long jump, 200 and 400 relay.

Another standout for the Kingsmen was Kellen Watson, who ran on the 400 relay and was the individual champion in the 100.

Coker and Watson helped lead Penn to the regional title. The Kingsmen finished with 96 points, while runner-up Warsaw totaled 71.

"We have a bunch of guys who love to compete, so we felt pretty good coming into today," said Penn coach Chad Wetzel. "But we knew it would be tight and be a three team race between us, Warsaw and Elkhart.

"In 20 plus of years of coaching I've never had athletes like Elijah and Kellen. They're so special and so different. Those two were awesome tonight."

Elkhart, which finished third with 64 points, got a second place showing from its 400 relay team of Zachary Anderson, Anthony Leonard, Alfonzo Newbern and Nathan Munson. That unit finished with a school-record time of 41.46.

The Lions also got third place performances from Anderson in the 100, Richter in the 3,200 and Trinton Harris in the long jump.

"We're in the top three in the state in the 400 relay," said Elkhart coach Adam Homo. "In our 3,200 relay we were about a second off the school-record. I'm really happy with that. We could probably drop another five or six seconds, which is our goal.

"Max was going for points for us in the two-mile. He ran a great mile. That was his fastest time of the season. I'm excited to see what he can do next week. Our sprinters looked great. Trinton Harris is going down to state for the long jump. We represented ourselves extremely well. I'm very proud of our team."

Concord finished fourth with 57 points. The Minutemen were led by sophomore Jackson Yoder, with finished first in the 800 with a clocking of 1:56.85.

"Just consistent hard work," said Yoder on why he won the 800 on Thursday. "I was just trying to stay right behind the guy in first place, which I did pretty well. Then I knew I had to have a kick in the last 200 meters. I just gave it everything I had."

Jaron Thomas finished second in the 100 for the Minutemen, as he finished with a time of 10.78.

"Kellen Watson is very talented in the 100," said Thomas. "I ran up against some great competition. I ran my best race of the year today and I'm proud of that. I'm glad that I have the opportunity to get even better for next week."

Concord coach CJ Shafer was happy with his team's point total.

"We wanted to score over 50 points and we got 57," said Shafer. "That was good. We had a good night. Not quite great. We have liked to have done a little bit better. We had a couple of fourth places that were pretty painful. But, overall, we competed really, really well.

"It's very encouraging that a lot of young guys did well for us tonight. Jackson Yoder was unbelievable and two guys are going to get through in the 100 (Thomas and Joseph Moon) by hitting the standard. Our 400 relay set a school-record (41.97)."

Thomas, Moon, Char'rese Breveard and Simeon Lake were on that 400 relay for Concord.

Northridge got a pair of second place finishes with those events being the 3,200 relay and 1,600 relay. On the 3,200 were David Gingerich, Trevin Schlabach, Joe Keyser and Baylor Miller. On the 1,600 were Jason Bauta, Mathias Hazen, Max Estep and Jaden Fisher.

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GOSHEN REGIONAL

Team scores: Penn 96, Warsaw 71, Elkhart 64, Concord 57, SB St. Joseph 46, Mishawaka 38, Northridge 27, SB Adams 23, Columbia City 23, LaVille 23, Tipton 20, Kokomo 16, Maconaquah 16, Manchester 13, NorthWood 12, Goshen 12, Culver Academies 11, SB Riley 7, SB Washington 7, Tippecanoe Valley 6, Bremen 5, Cass 5, Marian 4, Western 4, Trinity (Greenlawn) 4, Jimtown 4, Madison-Grant 3, Pioneer 3, Eastern (Greentown) 2, Triton 1, Fairfield 1.

3200 relay: Elkhart (Max Huckleberry, Jackson Ezzell, Aaron Richter, Max Malloy) 7:55; Northridge 7:57; Warsaw 7:58; SB St. Joseph 8:10.25; Trinity 8:10.60; Goshen 8:12; Concord 8:13; Pioneer 8:20.

110 hurdles: Luke Kaufhold (SJ) 14.46, Skyler VanSkyhawk (Mish) 14.79, Blake Keene (War) 14.81, Carson Heath (Man) 15.16, Cooper Altherr (Tip) 15.18, Tray'von Fleming (Riley) 15.76, Ernest Jennings (Con) 15.89, Eric Pohl (War) 16.65.

100: Kellen Watson (Penn) 10.61, Jaron Thomas (Con) 10.78, Zachary Anderson (Elk) 10.91, Nathan Munson (Elk) 10.96, Joseph Moon (Con) 10.99, Jaquan Patton (Wash) 11.03, Robert Nabieu (Riley) 11.12, Javan May (Triton) 11.18.

1600: Marcus Ridge (CC) 4:16, Max Malloy (Elk) 4:17, Xavier Miller (NR) 4:18, Isaac Howk (SBA) 4:20, Luke Kincaid (Bre) 4:28, Tanner Mammolenti (Penn) 4:29, Dorian Diaz (Gos) 4:30, Leighton Dodt (Pion) 4:33.

400 relay: Penn (Kohen Turner, Elijah Coker, Camden Anderson, Kellen Watson) 41.11; Elkhart 41.46; Concord 41.97; St. Joseph 42.41; Washington 42.47; NorthWood 42.87; Kokomo 43.08; Mishawaka 43.08.

400: AJ Kelly (Macon) 49.22, John Afari-Aikins (Culver) 49.39, Aldan Zolman (Mish) 49.86, Dalex Moreira (Con) 50.63, Jack Moran (SJ) 50.76, Bishop Williams (Jim) 51.24, Dylan DeDario (Penn) 51.27, Hudson Fox (Brem) 51.46.

300 hurdles: Luke Kaufhold (SJ) 38.74, Cooper Altherr (Tip) 39.69, Keaton Nash (Penn) 40.17, Blake Keene (War) 40.22, Eli Metzger (Man) 40.60, Joe Mitschelen (NW) 40.96, Jaedon Parker (Penn) 40.97, Skyler VanSkyhawk (Mish) 41.53.

800: Jackson Yoder (Con) 1:56, Marcus Ridge (CC) 1:57.22, Bol Agwick (SBA) 1:57.52, Daniel Mullett (CC) 1:58, Dorian Diaz (Gos) 1:59, Shahmeer Turk (Penn) 2:00, Isaiah Wittenberg (Macon) 2:01, Hudson Kaser (Penn) 2:03.

200: Elijah Coker (Penn) 21.89, Kohen Turner (Penn) 22.19, Wade Jones (TV) 22.41, Jacob Wetzel (NR) 22.48, Simeon Lake (Con) 22.53, Zachary Anderson (Elk) 22.60, AJ Kelly (Macon) 23.03, Robert Nabieu (SBR) 23.22.

3200: Jason Gackenheimer (War) 9:19, Liam Bauschke (Mish) 9:25, Aaron Richter (Elk) 9:35, Max Malloy (Elk) 9:40, Camden Raab (West) 9:41, Will Ruszkowski (Culver) 9:43, Brandon Mueller (Penn) 9:50, Evan Correll (FF) 9:51.

1600 relay: Penn (Dylan DeDario, Phillip Harris, Taylor Bauer, Elijah Coker) 3:23.22; Northridge 3:23.43; Mishawaka 3:24; Adams 3:27.57; Concord 3:27.83; St. Joseph 3:28; Warsaw 3:31; Pioneer 3:32.

Discus: Michael Good (LaV) 178-3, Kameron Kauffman (War) 170-1, Jedaiah (Kok) 168-6, Donovan Arnold (Con) 155-4, Trenton Bias (Elk) 153-4, Rosin White (MG) 152-11, Christopher Adams (Con) 150-11, Connor Thomas (Elk) 150-2.

Shot put: Kameron Kauffman (War) 55-10, Gage Goralski (Penn) 55-.25, Tyler Bowman (NW) 53-8, Christopher Adams (Con) 52-8.50, Kaleb Johnson (Mar) 52-4.50, Evan Adams (SBA) 49-8, Andrew Cavazos (East) 49-5, James Leiter (War) 48-10.

Long jump: Elijah Coker (Penn) 24-2.50, Jeremiah Young (Kok) 22-4.50, Trinton Harris (Elk) 21-9.50, Bill Imanene (SJ) 21-8, Tashon King (SBA) 21-7.50, Drew Elliott (Gos) 21-4.50, Bryan Forbes (Penn) 21.3.50, Robert Nabieu (SBR) 21-2.50.

High jump: Jordan Randall (War) 7-.50, Trey Thomas (Mish) 6-4, Talan Asay (War) 6-4, Julian Levine (Cass) 6-3, Carson Heath (Man) 6-3, Tayson Bardo (Penn) 6-3, Trinton Harris (Elk) 6-2, Javen Jackson (Jim) 6-2.

Pole vault: Lincoln Hulsey (LaV) 15-9.25, Caleb Farr (Tip) 15-3, Mavric Poe (Penn) 14-6, Matt Marsh (War) 14-3, Brady Farrell (SJ) 14-0, Matthew Schaefer (LaV) 14-0, Kyler Hanson (Mac) 13-6, Ian Parrott (War) 13-3.