Kokomo Tribune - Sunday, May 02, 2010

Kokomo — As the Kokomo boys track and field team celebrated its landmark victory in the 86th annual Kokomo Relays Saturday at Walter Cross Field, coach Tom Byrnes reminded the Wildkats that the last time they captured the relays — 1995 — was also the last time Kokomo won a state title.

While Byrnes in no way is predicting another title of such magnitude this season, he does want to serve notice that the Kats have bigger fish to fry in 2010.

“It was a total team effort and that’s what it’s going to take,” Byrnes said of Kokomo’s 119 points that shaded defending champion Western (110) and North Central Conference foe Marion (93).

“Hopefully we can use this as a building point. There’s some other things we’d like to do this year, and winning the Kokomo Relays is a lot of fun but it’s not winning the conference or a sectional.”

Northwestern was fifth with 61 points while Maconaquah (40) finished sixth and Peru (16) eighth.

The Kats collected five wins on the day, including three relays — all including Walter Cross Award winner Adrian Glover.

Running the 1,600 meters, Glover made a stellar move on Western senior Austin Young on the final lap of the medley relay to help Diamanta Hayes, Tyler Pigg and Jordan Lee to a time of 7:53.07.

Glover came back with the 800-meter anchor of the middle distance relay team of Michael Clifton, Tony Moses and Lee. They were clocked in 5:51.84 as Glover edged the anchor runner from Crown Point.

“I knew I could hang with Austin for three laps, but if he [made a move] at 800 meters I was worried he’d [lose] me,” said Glover, a junior. “I was able to stay with him and out-kick him.

“It feels great [to win the championship]. We haven’t been this good in a long time and I think a lot of records are going to fall this year. It’s a big deal.”

In the meet’s final event, the sprint medley relay, Glover ran a 400 leg as he, John Alsup, Clifton and Moses won in 2:29.55.

“He did a super job,” Byrnes said of Glover. “Adrian has worked extremely hard to get where he’s at. … He ran with a lot of guts and a lot of courage.”

Alsup had an outstanding day. He won long jump with a leap of 23 feet, 2 inches; he finished second in the 100-meter dash and he anchored the third-place 400-meter relay team.

David Sirmons won shot put with a heave of 50-21⁄2 and was second in discus behind Western’s Trevor Buckalew (152-4). Taylor Killings and Robert Lancaster finished 2-3 in the 110-meter high hurdles for Kokomo and Vincent Jackson was third behind Sirmons in discus.

“We’re a good track team,” said Byrnes. “Sometimes we get overshadowed by really good competition and I’m just really happy for our kids.”

Western coach Marvin Boswell was hoping late results in high jump and pole vault, where the Panthers totaled 27 points, would help his team repeat.

“It was just so close coming down to the wire,” said Boswell. “Kokomo has a fine team this year.”

Besides Buckalew, Western’s wins came from Chris Love (2:27.54) in the 1,000-yard run and the shuttle hurdle relay team of Jacob Hopkins, Indy Mathew, Cody Jansen and Aaron Van Auken in 1:03.88.

But there were too many missed opportunities like the medley relay and the 3,200-meter run, where Maconaquah’s Jacob Bingham (9:59.37) edged Young by 4/100ths of a second.

“It seemed like we were in so many tight races where we just got edged out,” Boswell said. “It was nice to see Chris Love come back in the 1,000-yard run. What a gutsy race for him to come back and run as well as he did in the last 150 meters.”

Northwestern got a win from Austin Finley, who topped the high jump competition with a leap of 6 feet, edging Van Auken on faults.

“I was a little concerned about Austin because of the way races were falling,” Purple Tigers coach Dave Stevens said. “Austin did a very good job of managing the meet and still being able to win high jump. He’s getting stronger all the time.”

“I kept looking at [the score] and thinking, ‘Oh, we’re behind by five, we’re behind by four, we’re behind by six,’” said Boswell, “and then all of a sudden it was like, we’ve got 18 points over here. That and the high jump was a pleasant surprise.”

Aaron Van Auken won the high jump for the Panthers with a leap of 6 feet and John Capps was fourth. With Indy Mathew second in long jump and Bart Shepherd third in discus, Western scored 51 points in the field events to offset only one victory on the track.

The Giants won four races, including the medley relay, the sprint medley relay and the middle distance relay, but had only nine points in the field. Marion’s Devin Randle ran a leg of all three winning relays and was named the Walter Cross Award recipient by the Kokomo Tribune.

Van Auken, in addition to winning high jump, was third in the 110-meter high hurdles (with Mathew fourth) and teamed with Trent Lawlyes, Harter and Mathew to capture the shuttle hurdles relay in 1:06.75. Austin Young was second in the 3,200 meters.

“Aaron Van Auken winning the high jump, John Capps coming in fourth, that was huge for us to get 15 points out of that and 18 out of the pole vault,” Boswell said. “We knew we had a shot at [the team championship] and I just hoped that we had enough depth to prevail and we did. I was real proud of all the kids.”

Kokomo, which got wins from Cliff Burns (49 feet, 1/2 inch) in shot put and John Alsup (20-5 1/4) in long jump, would have fared better if not for a disqualification in the shuttle hurdles.

“The kids are disappointed and they’re pouting too much about it, but it’s just part of life and we’ve got to go on,” Kats coach Tom Byrnes said. “If we did what we’re supposed to do [in the shuttle hurdles], we’re ahead of Marion, and the last time I saw the state polls Richmond was 16th and Marion was 25th.

“We’re still on the young side, but we feel like we have something to show when it comes conference and sectional time.”

Kokomo’s Robert Lancaster was second in the 110 high hurdles and Alsup was seventh in the 100-meter dash. David Sirmons was second in discus and Jerell Johnson finished third in shot put.

Brock Ford led the Purple Tigers by winning the discus (142-6 1/2) and finishing second in the shot (48-11). Kory Kennedy won the 3,200-meter run in 9:59.84. Austin Finley was third in the high jump while Sam Freeman and Jeremy Robison finished 3-4 in the 1,000-yard run.

Peru’s Aaron Garretson easily won the 1,000 in 2:20.25.

Noblesville runs away with girls championship

Kokomo — The good news is someone finally halted Warsaw’s streak of Kokomo Relays girls championships at four Saturday at Walter Cross Field.

The bad news is a new dominant force may have emerged as a newcomer, the Noblesville Millers, captured the 2010 title with 131 points. Warsaw finished second with 107.5.

None of that bothered Kokomo coach Dave Barnes though. His Wildkats’ third-place finish with 83.5 points, ahead of fourth-place Northwestern (60), was fine with him.

“We knew coming in those two teams were probably top 20 teams, but we chased those great teams to great times and we had personal-bests everywhere,” Barnes said. “I thought we had an outstanding day [Saturday]. I was totally pleased.”

Western (52) was fifth and Peru (32) seventh.

Brielle Bonnafon led the Kats with her win in long jump with a leap of 16 feet, 71⁄4 inches. She also led off the winning sprint medley team that included Emily Keller, Courtney Gilman and Madi Cassidy; ran a leg of the second-place 400-meter relay team and had a hand in the shuttle hurdle team that finished third.

Kokomo appeared on its way to a win in the middle distance relay until anchor Annika Taber was bumped and lost control of the baton.

“The only disappointment we had was the [middle distance relay],” said Barnes. “There was pretty good contact over there [on the second turn] and that’s a judge’s call. The baton got knocked out of [Taber’s] hand and she had to go back and pick it up.”

Clarissa Woodard was second in discus with a personal-best throw and Hailey Rice was third in pole vault as Kokomo now looks to the North Central Conference meet.

“The conference, that’s the one we’ve been after all year,” Barnes said. “Huntington [North] is very good and we have to have a great race [to win]. That’s one these seniors have been wanting for four years.”

Noblesville’s Izzy May was named the Walter Cross Award winner. She captured both shot put and discus, the latter distance a meet record-shattering 137 feet, 8 inches.

Northwestern’s best finish was Kylie Ballard’s second place in high jump, where Steph Colter was fourth. Kara DeFabritis was third in long jump and Allie Combs was third in discus.

Breanna Cable finished second in shot put and fourth in discus for the Panthers. Western coach Marvin Boswell commended Britteny Cornelius, who finished fifth in shot put.

“This was the first time she’s been in a big meet like this and she stepped up and improved four feet in the shot put from 28 feet to 32 feet,” Boswell said. “She continues to get better and better and those are going to be big points for us later.”

me happy, and they know what they have to do to keep going. I was very pleased to be tied with Marion.”