BW seniors claim fourth straight girls title at ‘Red’ Edwards Relays

Big Walnut’s Olivia Daggett crosses the fin­ish line in her heat to give the Golden Eagles a second-place fin­ish in the 4x400 relay race at Saturday’s Big Wal­nut “Red” Edwards Golden Eagle Relays. The host Golden Eagles edged out Olen­tangy Lib­erty by three points (101–98) to win the meet title. (Photo by Lenny C. Lepola)

By GARY HENERY

News Man­ag­ing Editor

The Big Wal­nut Class of 2012 accom­plished some­thing no other Golden Eagles’ girls track team has achieved since 1984 — win­ning four straight Big Wal­nut “Red” Edwards Golden Eagle Relay championships.

Big Wal­nut, win­ning three events and scor­ing 101 points, held off a strong chal­lenge from Olen­tangy Lib­erty to edge the Patri­ots, who tal­lied 98 points, by three points to cap­ture Saturday’s annual Spring clas­sic at Golden Eagle Stadium.

“This senior class has won all four Eagle Relays they have com­peted in, a feat not accom­plished since the class of 1984,” Big Wal­nut head girls track coach Joe Evener said. “That speaks vol­umes about their tal­ent, work ethic and deter­mi­na­tion. When I told them that we had won dur­ing the final laps of the 4x800 relay, you could see the thrill and pride light up their faces.

“I am so proud of my girls. When you win a meet with this type of cal­iber of teams it is a tes­ti­mony to the heart of a team. They com­peted hard, and scratched and clawed for every sin­gle point,” he con­tin­ued. “There were so many key per­for­mances, and I loved the way they all stepped up and com­peted. Dur­ing the course of a meet not every­thing goes in your favor, and the test of a true cham­pion is to over­come those dif­fi­cul­ties; and, as always, they did not disappoint.”

Big Walnut’s vic­to­ries came in the long jump event with Olivia Small, Avery Kerns and Leah Thomas (45 feet, 3 ¼ inches); in the sprint med­ley with Catie Craig-Bowden, Olivia Daggett, Emily Asher and Bethany Bogantz (1 minute, 53.8 sec­onds) and in the 4x100 relay with Cal­lie Car­i­oti, Jamie Annis, Olivia Small and Thomas (0:51.3).

Daggett, a sopho­more, drew praise from Evener for her ded­i­ca­tion in the meet.

“Going in to Saturday’s meet Olivia was only sched­uled to run one race for sure, the lap med­ley, but I made sure she under­stood that she needed to be ready for any unfore­seen cir­cum­stances,” he said. “Early in the morn­ing one girl became ill, and it was nec­es­sary to move Olivia into the dis­tance med­ley, which is the third to last race. Then, unex­pect­edly, Brea Med­lock cramped up after her anchor leg on the win­ning sprint med­ley team. I called on Olivia to step up and anchor the 4x400 relay and she ran a great leg, win­ning our heat of the race and plac­ing sec­ond overall.”

The Golden Eagle seniors were quick to express their appre­ci­a­tion for Daggett’s performance.

“To demon­strate how classy our group of seniors are, they came to me after the meet and said they had talked about it and they feel that the tro­phy for “Ath­lete of the Meet” should go to Olivia for the way she rose to the occa­sion and per­formed so well,” Evener reported. “I couldn’t be prouder of her and our seniors.”

Big Walnut’s pole vault team of Jor­dan Lyle, Krystina Stacy and Emily Asher which placed sec­ond in the meet, was acknowl­edged by Evener for not only break­ing the 2004 school record with a vault of 23 feet, 6 inches, but for putting the Golden Eagles in a posi­tion to win the meet.

“Jor­dan, Krystina and Emily’s sec­ond place fin­ish in the pole vault was a key moment in the meet, as it tied us with Lib­erty with four events left on the track,” Evener said. “Not only am I proud of their record, but with the fact they are get­ting bet­ter and bet­ter under coach (Kevin) Abrams, and the points they scored and the record they broke is proof of this.”

Big Wal­nut also posted sec­onds by Shelby Brad­ford, Alayna Small, Amber Sha­heen and Jamie Annis in the shut­tle hur­dles (1:08.9); Annis, Liz Carty, Asia Med­lock and Daggett in the 4x400 relay (4:20.7); and Cal­lie Car­i­oti, Annis, Thomas and Brea Med­lock in the 4x200 Relay (1:49.4). High Jump – Olivia Small, Avery Kerns and Randi Ram­mels­berg tied for sec­ond in the high jump (14–2).

Golden Eagle thirds were scored by Bogantz, Asher, Makenna Hem­ming and Stephanie Keller in the 4x1600 relay (23:59.5); Craig-Bowden, Daggett, Asher and Bogantz in the lap med­ley (14:05.7) 14:05.7; and by Stephanie Keller, Liz Carty, Daggett and Hem­ming in the dis­tance med­ley (10:26.5).

Posted by Gary Henery on Apr 11 2012. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS Feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.