At their final home meet, the SCH boys’ track team honored nine departing seniors: (from left) Nadir Shakir, Bruce Howard, Billy Harris, Hunter Ferry, Jack Allison, Willy Rappoport, Will Concannon, Harrison Kapp, Sam McDowell. (Photo by Tom Utescher)[/caption]

by Tom Utescher

Regular-season dual meets aren’t tremendously important in the overall scheme of things during track and field season. For last Tuesday’s coed gathering at Springside Chestnut Hill Academy, a number of girls were missing for visiting Episcopal Academy because they were prepping for the annual Delaware County championships that would begin two days later.

Still, the final home Inter-Ac League meet gave the host Blue Devils an opportunity to bid an official farewell to the Class of 2016: Jack Allison, Brooklynn Broadwater, Will Concannon, Hunter Ferry, Billy Harris, Bruce Howard, Harrison Kapp, Sam McDowell, Calder McNeil, Willy Rappoport, Julia Reeves, Nadir Shakir, and Essence Walden.

Broadwater has signed with the University of Tennessee, while Reeves is going to continue her track career at Cornell and Concannon will run for Elon University.

In addition, Tuesday’s encounter gave several SCH athletes the chance to establish new personal records in specific events. This began in the opening event of the afternoon with first-place PR performances in the high hurdles by sophomore Earl Patterson (15.8 seconds) and freshman Bee Adams (16.4). In the boys’ event, Blue Devil junior Evan Krawczuk came in third in 19.65.

In the 100 meter dash SCH had a one-two finish in the girls’ race from Broadwater (12.25) and Reeves (12.3), while Shakir won the boys’ race in 11.8 seconds and freshman Rob Gentile was one-tenth behind in second place.

Juniors Rebecca Saunders (6:04.0) and Vince Qian (7:02.0) were first and second for SCH in the girls’ 1600, while Episcopal won the boys’ race and the next two spots went to Blue Devils junior Noah Chandler (4:40.0), and Concannon (4:42.0).

In Inter-Ac competition, only the girls run a 4 x 100 relay, and here the SCH foursome of Walden, freshman Nayah Moore, McNeil and Reeves breezed to the win in 51.5 seconds over a pair of Episcopal quartets. The home team then won both 400 meter races thanks to Ferry (52.3) and sophomore Haley Unthank (1:02.0)

The top two spots in the girls’ 300 hurdles were snapped up by Broadwater (47.2) and Adams (48.5), while Patterson won for the boys in 45.08 and Krawczuk was third in 51.0.

At Senior Recognition Day for girls’ track and field, SCH celebrated the accomplishments of (from left) Calder McNeil, Brooklynn Broadwater, Julia Reeves, and Essence Walden. (Photo by Tom Utescher)[/caption]

Unthank doubled down with a victory in the girls’ 800 meters (2:42.1), where freshman Lilly Forrest finished third in 2:49.7. Ferry was third among the boys in 2:10.7. In the 200 meter dash, Broadwater (25.6) and Reeves (27.1) were back with a one-two punch for the meet hosts, while Sakir was second in the boys’ contest with a new PR of 24 seconds flat.

The competitors quickly became widely separated in the 3200 meter run, where an unchallenged Concannon won in 10:25.0 and Forrest was third among the girls in 14:20.0.

Most of Episcopal’s regular 4 x 400 relay runners were among the missing girls for the Churchwomen, so the female foursome from SCH ran along with the boys. Adams went out very quickly at the beginning, and didn’t get passed by the first of the boys until the end of the back straight.

Ultimately, the Blue Devil girls (Adams, Walden, Reeves, Unthank) beat one of the EA boys’ relay teams. Another group of Churchmen won the race, and SCH (Kapp, Shakir, Patterson, Ferry) was second in 4:04.5. The girls clocked in at 4:24.0; their regular line-up, which includes Broadwater and sophomore Allie Kitchell (who was resting an injury last Tuesday), has been timed in 3:50.95.

In the field events, the Springside Chestnut Hill boys saw new PR’s from Patterson (first in the triple jump in 36’6.5”), junior David Brenman (second in the pole vault at 10’6”) and Allison (third in the pole vault at 10’0”). There were second-place finishes by senior Bruce Howard in the long jump (19’1.5”) and freshman Ryan McManness in the high jump (5’8”).

The girls left the high jump bar a good deal lower than that as Moore and junior Libby Jefferson walked away with a tie for first and moved on to other things. In the triple jump, Jefferson was second (30’10.5”) and Moore third (30’8.0”), while Walden won by travelling 33’3.0”.

Adams won the long jump with a leap of 16’9.5”, Walden was second at 16’5.0”, and Jefferson was third at 15’9.0”. Episcopal made a sweep of the top three spots in the boys’ shot put, and SCH’s Moore was second among the girls with a toss of 29’0”.