|
Republished with permission granted by The Washington Newspaper Publishing Co. LLC d/b/a MediaDC. Back to Montgomery Journal articles
Peary, B-CC Win State Track Titles
By Donna Niewiaroski
Although Walter Johnson fell in its bid for the state Class A track title and had to settle for third behind perennial power Fairmont Heights and runner-up South Carroll, Peary's Huskies made good on their bid at Annapolis and tallied 39 points for their first State AA indoor track title.
Peary, traditionally recognized as a power in the outdoor field events, placed at least one in the top six in six events, each achieving personal bests in their championship quest. Grant Wagner and Jeff Torri took 1-3 in the pole vault; Emil Davis ran third in the 600; an ailing Doug Halpin finished third in the mile and courageously came back to finish fifth in the two mile; shot putter Andry Nowosiwski scored sixth and the two-mile relay ran a fantastic race to take second.
"I'm very happy, everybody that scored did very well," claimed head coach Tom Nawrocki. "The talent in the AA class is spread out very evenly so although we didn't score as many points as I had thought we would, it was enough to win. It got pretty tense at the end, though. With four events to go we were 16 points ahead but we didn't have any more points to score and we had to just sit and watch."
Pole vaulters Wagner and Torri and the two-mile relay team of Duane Gaskin, Brian Clark, Jim Anderson and Ted Thompson were the team's top performers. Grant vaulted to first place honors with a 13'6", an incredible six inches higher than his previous best. Torri, who led the field to the 13' mark, his career high, stayed there to hold on to third.
"The two-mile relay team was amazing," explained Nawrocki. "They ran with Friendly the entire race and it came down to the last 100 yards. They ran nine seconds faster than the school record." Nawrocki had figured the relay to finish in the top three or four and the 8:11.6 clocking was good enough for second place. Second leg Brian Clark led the field in time-improvement, chopping a whopping seven seconds off his previous best. Thompson, Gaskins and Anderson each lowered their best 880 by two to three seconds.
Nawrocki also commended Davis for a smart run in the 600 and Halpin for his unexpected third in the mile and comeback effort in the two-mile run.
B-CC's girls astonished Central and Fairmont Heights and outclassed the pre-meet favorites 68-55.5-49.5 respectively to claim their first indoor state title Friday night at Towson.
"B-CC's girls were very good," explains Fairmont Heights coach Bob Rothenberg. "It's not that anybody else ran poorly, they just ran extremely well. Where we scored two points less than we expected they'd score 10 more."
Sprint sensation Cathy Rattray led the Barons championship drive with two individual victories and the anchor leg on the winning mile relay. Rattray, seeded second in the 600, overcame front runner Sheila Harris for a victory in a 1:27.8, six seconds faster than her clocking in the District meet. She then outleaned Central's Pam Carter to win the 60 yard dash with identical times of 7.2. B-CC's mile relay of Nancy Obenland, Laurie Douglass, Connie Coward and Rattray beat Central by over two seconds with a 4:14.2, fourteen seconds faster than their District meet winning time.
B-CC's Stacey Browne took off at the mile mark and led a Montgomery County sweep of the two-mile run winning in 11:33.1, 10 seconds swifter than her district run. Second place Debbie Wortman of Magruder crossed the line twenty seconds later and Seneca Valley's Diana Jordan finished third. Montgomery County runners also ran 1-2-3 in the mile run. Seneca Valley's middle distance standout Theresa Brown, who also scored a second in a quick-paced 1000, lead B-CC's Douglas and Walter Johnson's Regina Guay with a win in 5:17.7, a nine second improvement over her District time.
Walter Johnson placed the highest among four Montgomery County teams in the top seven of the boys A State meet with a third place finish. Seneca Valley followed with a fifth. Kennedy was sixth and Einstein seventh. And despite the less than hoped for team finishes, county individuals dominated the distance events and turned in some exceptional performances.
Doug Rohrer, Seneca Valley's state cross country champion, led a county sweep of the two-mile run. Rohrer, teamate Mike Hoppes and Einstein's John Neff left the pack at the mile mark and two laps later the Eagles distance duo again picked up the pace, leaving Neff 10 seconds behind. Rohrer and Hoppes crossed the tape three tenths of a second apart with times of 9:37.6 and 9:37.9.
Rohrer bettered his district time in the mile to take second in a 4:24.8 to South Carroll's Todd Ashley. Marshall Tarzy of Kennedy, who took second to Neff in the District meet, hung on to leaders Ashley and Rohrer and secured third in a 4:25.9, a personal best. |
