Eagle relay pleased with second
State record falls in girls 4×100
Apple Valley’s Brita Dawson hands off to teammate Emily Bonewell during the girls 4×100-meter relay preliminaries at the state Class AA track and field meet. The two teamed with Jaryn Pipkins and Megan Maki to take second place in the finals to a Hopkins team that set a state meet record. Photo by Rick Orndorf
Apple Valley could not win a second consecutive state championship in the girls 4×100-meter relay. But the Eagles’ runners couldn’t be too disappointed, considering the team that beat them this year set a state meet record.
“I know I felt like I left it all out there,” said Jaryn Pipkins, a junior. “And in this meet, you should feel that way.”
The second place by the girls 4×100 relay was tied for the best finish by an Apple Valley High School athlete at last weekend’s state Class AA track and field meet at Hamline University. Jordan Charles also was a state runner-up in the boys triple jump.
Pipkins teamed with Megan Maki, Brita Dawson and Emily Bonewell to run the girls 4×100 in 48.44 seconds. Although the Eagles improved on their preliminary time by more than eight-tenths of a second, they couldn’t catch Hopkins, which blazed to victory in 47.73. That time broke a state meet record set by Minneapolis Washburn in 2004.
Pipkins and Maki ran on an Eagles team that won the 4×100 relay at state last year. Apple Valley might make a run at the title next year, too; of the four girls who ran on this year’s relay, only Bonewell graduates.
The Apple Valley athlete said they put in a lot of time on refining their handoffs, and all three exchanges worked smoothly in the state finals.
“That’s really the biggest thing because you can move up or down a place by hundredths of a second,” Dawson said.
The second-place relay finish was worth 10 team points to the Eagles, who were 10th in the Class AA team standings with 25. Fourteen more points came from the pole vault, where junior Hannah Linder and senior Kelsey Harms finished third and fourth.
Linder cleared 11 feet, 6 inches, the same height as state champion Emily Guimont of Edina and runner-up Paige Clements of Mounds View. But none of the three could break the 11-6 barrier, and Guimont earned the title because she had the fewest missed vaults.
Harms topped a list of four vaulters that cleared 11-3.
Eagles senior Marissa Akinseye finished ninth in the shot put at 38-9 1/2. She was one of five throwers from the South Suburban Conference to place in the top nine.
Apple Valley’s boys narrowly missed coming away from the state meet with a team trophy. The South Suburban Conference and Section 3AA champions were fourth at state with 41 points. The top three teams receive trophies.
Jordan Charles, a junior, went 46-1 in the triple jump to take second place behind Park of Cottage Grove senior Rilwan Alowonle, the star of the Class AA state meet. Alowonle won the triple jump, 110 hurdles and 300 hurdles, and ran on Park’s first-place 4×100 relay.
Apple Valley placed third in two relays. Quinn Hooks, Charles, Dom McDew-Stauffer and Steven Wilson ran the 4×200 in 1:28.24.
The Eagles were defending state champions in the 4×100 and took third this year with DaShawn Lewis, Hooks, Patrick O’Neil and Wilson finishing in 42.68.
Jalen Stewart, Alex Brandel, Charles and Mitch Hechsel finished sixth in the 4×400 relay in 3:24.97.
Other top-nine finishers for the Apple Valley boys were Kevin Davis in the 110 hurdles (fifth, 14.61), McDew-Stauffer in the discus (fifth, 155-0) and Hechsel in the 400 (eighth, 49.55). Individuals and relays that finish in the top nine at the state meet earn All-State recognition.
Wayzata won the boys team championship at the Class AA state meet while Lakeville South won the girls title.
Eastview
Leandre Kennedy of Eastview runs the 100-meter dash preliminaries at the state Class AA track and field meet. Kennedy went on to place eighth in the finals. Photo by Rick Orndorf
Eastview was 35th in the boys and girls team standings at the Class AA meet last weekend.
Junior Erica Bestul led Eastview’s girls with a fifth-place finish in the 800. Her time was 2:15.30. Allie Funk, also a junior, cleared 11-3 to finish sixth in the pole vault, just 3 inches short of the winning height.
The Lightning’s Melita Ware was 12th in the triple jump.
Eastview also had a medal winner in the boys pole vault, where senior Brendan Cole cleared 14-0 to tie for fourth place. The other Lightning athlete to score points at state was senior sprinter Leandre Kennedy, who was eighth in the 100.
Rosemount
Rosemount ninth-grader Rachel Schow (right) runs the 100-meter hurdles preliminaries at the state track and field meet. Photo by Rick Orndorf
Rosemount girls made the Class AA finals in two hurdles races last weekend. Rachel Schow, the only ninth-grader to reach the finals in the 100 hurdles, placed sixth in 15.15. Madeline Phillips, a senior, finished eighth in the 300 hurdles in 46.43. They scored Rosemount’s six team points at state.
The Irish boys didn’t get on the state team scoreboard this year. Coming closest to a top-nine finish was senior Chandler Dye, who was 10th in the 1,600.
