Day 3 of the AIA State Championships concluded the State meet with several nail-biting finishes and quite a few upsets
Throws
Scottsdale Prep's Weston Wright (Sr.) and Karsten Santaella (Jr.) doubled down on 1st and 2nd place once again in the Discus, with throws of 173-06 to 161-08. Valley Christian's Jordan Larson (Sr.) took 3rd with a throw of 157-04. After placing 2nd in the Division 4 Girls' Discus, Hannah Ringel (Sedona Red Rock, Sr.) won the Division 4 Girls' Shot Put by over 6 feet. Luciana Chavez (Bisbee, Jr.) took 2nd with her toss of 33-11.25.
Jumps
Joe Glomski (Sedona Red Rock, Sr.) returned to Riggs Stadium on Saturday to capture his 2nd State Title, this time in the Long Jump with a mark of 23-06. Kayla Sklar (Scottsdale Prep, SR.) won the Division 4 Girls Triple Jump with a mark of 34-11.25, only two inches behind her Season-best from Chandler Rotary.
Hurdles
For the first meet of the day, 2016 Division 3 runner-up Rhett Bingham (Round Valley, Sr.) ran 15.36 to cap off his high school career with a State Title in the D4 Boys' 110 Hurdles. The top ranked returning State-Champion, Jessica Sherwood (Pima, Jr.) and her teammate Audrey Goodman went 1-2 in the Girls 100 Hurdles running 15.95 and 16.15 in a -3.6 headwind. Kaleb Mattice (Thatcher, Sr.), also a returning State Champ, came back from a football injury to run his first meet of the season only two weeks prior to the State meet and win the intermediate hurdles once again in 40.33. His Thatcher teammate Becka Nicholas (So.) won the low hurdles in 47.87 over Freshman Kiana Kai (Gilbert Classical) who finished 2nd in 48.05.
Sprints
In the 100-meter dash, Pusch Ridge's underdog Edwin Lovett (Sr.) ran 11.73 to take 1st place. Scottsdale Prep's Matt Musial (Sr.) took 2nd in 11.79, but later won the 400 with a PR time of 50.75 and then the 200 that night in 24.10 only 3 one-hundredths of a second ahead of Tre'Quan Ricks (Tombstone, Sr.). On the Girls side, Kacy Haynes (Pusch Ridge, Jr.) won the Division 4 Girls 100-meter dash and later that evening the 200, with times of 13.12 and 27.57, respectively. After winning the Girls 100 Hurdles and finishing runner-up in the 100, Sherwood won the 100 in 61.14 seconds.
Distance
Veritas super-sophomore Meghan Barney completed her sweep of the individual distance races running 5:21.32 to dominate the 1600 by a margin of 14+ seconds and then 2:22.98 to win the 800. Trevor Tam (Horizon Honors, Sr.) also earned the Division 4 distance triple-crown after dominating the 3200 in 10:04. Pinon's Wesley Cook and Tyrin Begay took 2nd and 3rd with 10:11.11 and 10:15.99.
(Trevor Tam crosses the finish of the D4 Boys 3200-photo by John Hays)
Relays
The Gilbert Christian Boys 4x800 team started things off for the distance races, with a victory in 8:27.81. Valley Christian Boys took 1st in the 4x100 with a 45.10 performance only .14 seconds off their season best time, while the Pusch Ridge Christian Girls won the 400-meter Relay in 50.66 with their best performance of the season. Pusch Ridge Christian Boys won the Division 4 4x400 clocking in at 3:33.76. Finally, to close out the night the Scottsdale Prep dominated the Girls' 4x400 relay with a 4:16.92 run, delivered by a team of mostly underclassmen.
(Scottsdale Prep's Makenna Lane anchors 4x400-photo by John Hays)
Teams
At the end of the day the Scottsdale Prep Boys accumulated a total of 74 points for the win. Round Valley took 2nd with 59 points.
Pusch Ridge Christian won the Girls' Team Title with 72 points, only two ahead of the Scottsdale Prep Lady Spartans. (Pusch Ridge Christian Girls take 1st in Division 4-photo by John Hays)
