Kokomo Tribune - Saturday, May 17 2008

— Most members of Western’s boys track and field team had to wait only a day for their chance at winning the Kokomo Sectional, which was postponed by rain from Thursday to Friday, but Jerel Hall’s wait was much longer.

Ineligible for the team last season, Hall has been a dominant force for the Panthers in 2008, and no one’s presence was felt more than his at Walter Cross Field.

Hall swept the 100- and 200-meter dashes and anchored the victorious 4x100 relay team. When he and teammate Kyle Brown finished 1-3 in the 200, it gave Western a 20-point lead over runner-up Oak Hill and all but sealed the title for the Panthers, who won with 142 points.

The Golden Eagles were second with 109, followed by Northwestern (57), Kokomo (56.5), Peru (43), Eastern (41), Pioneer (40), Logansport (39), Madison-Grant (35), Maconaquah (22.5), Cass (22) and Taylor (16).

“He has just come out and has been wonderful,” first-year coach Marvin Boswell said of Hall. “Just talking with him earlier [in the day] you could see he had a little bit different attitude going into [Friday] night’s meet. I think he had something he wanted to prove. … Four individual championships, that’s pretty impressive.”

Just for good measure, Hall, a junior, capped the evening with a perfect 4-for-4 performance, helping the 4x400 relay team to victory.

Hall fell behind Brown early in the 100 but came back strong to win in 11.36, 4/100ths of a second ahead of Brown. Hall again had to mount a comeback in the 200, winning in 23.03.

Hall said it has been his privilege to run with the few seniors who were on the team the last time the Panthers won a sectional in 2005.

“I had a good time [Friday] running the 100 and the 200 and both relays,” Hall said. “Usually [the start is slow] but I’ve just got to drag it back in the end.

“[The seniors] have helped me greatly in events like the 4x1 and the 4x4, so I’m so glad to have them on my relay teams.”

One of those seniors is Alex Sigler. He contributed as a freshman in 2005 with a fifth-place finish in the 100, and the next year won a title in the 400 meters. He hasn’t been back atop the podium since as an individual, but that matters little to him now. He’s enjoyed taking his place as a leader of the Panthers.

“The thing that I look forward to is training these kids to be good leaders,” said Sigler, who was third in the 400, fourth in high jump, fifth in long jump and ran a leg on the winning 4x400 relay. “That was the one thing that made me improve, too.

“As a team, you won’t see a happier one than this right here. That’s the one thing I cherish more than the wins, more than the points, is just our camaraderie.”

Brown won long jump with a leap of 21 feet, 1/2 inch. Nursing a sore ankle, that was his only attempt. Patrick Lennon won the 110-meter high hurdles in 15.58 seconds, Kyle Young was second in the 400, Corey Scott was third in the 3,200 and Indy Mathew was a pleasant surprise, finishing third in the 300 hurdles.

The top four individuals and relays in each event advance to the Kokomo Regional on Thursday.

“That was a race [Mathew] had worked on a lot here this past week and was able to drop a lot of time,” said Boswell. “That was a big race for us to be able to come back and get some valuable points.

“I’m just so happy for [the team]. They’ve worked so hard this season and set this as our No. 1 goal, and they were able to come through and perform.”

Eastern’s Dakota Swisher was the only other Howard County athlete to win an individual title. He captured pole vault with a jump of 14 feet, 3 inches below his season’s best. He beat teammate Kevin Jackson, who cleared 13-6 for second place.

Swisher, a senior, said both Comet vaulters have a lot to live up to, with former Eastern standout Jeremy Ashcraft holding the Kokomo Tribune’s all-time area-best height of 16 feet, 1 inch.

“It’s hard to follow in [Ashcraft’s] footsteps, he’s set the bar real high,” said Swisher. “It’s just something to shoot for. I want to leave the bar high for whoever comes next.

“It’s been kind of back and forth between [Jackson] and me. We’ve both been up to Fort Wayne [to the Vault High Clinic] once a week for the past couple months. That’s helped us going up there.”

The Wildkats captured the 4x800 relay with Matt Wyss, Brandon Sheline, Devin White and Ian Holtson. They finished first in 8:21.92.

Coach Tom Byrnes was extremely happy to finish fourth with his young team, including performances such as Jerell Johnson, a first-year thrower, second in shot put and John Alsup, a freshman, third in long jump.

“Coming in I thought we might be the fifth-best team here, and we ended up just missing third by a half-point,” said the Kokomo mentor. “That’s that old coach in me wishing we had another half a point somewhere, but I’m very pleased with our kids.

“Probably what I’m most proud of is our [fourth-place] 4x1 relay team, which we have been forced to change for a variety of reasons. Then last Monday I had to put S.J. Moultrie on there, and I told him to just hang on to whatever we could get. We hung on and got to go to the regional meet.”

The Purple Tigers of Northwestern were hampered by several illnesses this week. They wound up without enough quarter-milers to run the 4x400 relay but finished third in the team standings anyway.

“We had two boys not show up for school this morning and that started the domino effect,” said coach Dave Stevens. One of his decisions was to pull Sam Freeman and Kory Kennedy from the 1,600 meters to concentrate on the 800, where Freeman finished fourth, and the 3,200, where Kennedy was second.

“Overall it was just a great night. The 1,600 was my toughest decision and finally I just decided to say we were going to give up that event and concentrate on the 800 and 3,200.”

Taylor advanced two athletes in three events. Sophomore Austen Conwell was third in the 110 high hurdles and fourth in the 300. Shawn Fogleman was fourth in the 100 meters.