By Larry Moritz
Salina Journal
GYPSUM -- Sadie Roesner is having fun, enjoying the recent run of success for the Southeast of Saline girls athletic teams.
That includes Friday's performance at the North Central Activities Association track and field meet at the Southeast High School Stadium, where Roesner and the Trojans didn't have a lot of individual champions, but came away with the girls team title.
"This year so far for the Southeast girls has been awesome," Roesner said shortly after the Trojans made the traditional victory lap in celebration of their title. "We finished first in the league in basketball and we were awesome in cross country.
"When we all pull it together we are just awesome and I'm really proud of our team."
Each of the other six teams in the league meet won at least two events, while Southeast's lone victory came from Aubrey Knox in the 100-meter hurdles.
But the Trojans, who did finish with eight second-place finishes, totaled 126 team points, topping runner-up Beloit with 100 1/2.
"We don't have one person who is going to get us all of our points," Roesner said. "It really rocks to have a bunch of talented girls.
"We believed the whole way through that we were going to win today. There was not a doubt in our minds what we would do. We're the Southeast Trojans."
The Beloit Trojans not only captured the boys team title, but won their share of individual events as well. Beloit finished first in eight of 18 events, including three golds for Cas Spangler.
The Trojan junior won the 110-meter hurdles, the 300 hurdles and the triple jump, and finished second to Kyle Lonberger of Minneapolis in the long jump. Spangler had season bests in the 300 hurdles, the long jump and triple jump, and was only three-quarters of an inch behind Lonberger's winning leap in the long jump.
"It was a pretty good day," Spangler said. "Coach has us doing speed work in practice and all the hard work is paying off."
Beloit's other five first-place finishes were spread out among five of Spangler's teammates: Aaron Catlin in the 1,600 run; Tyler Blass in the 3,200; Kevin Donahoo in the high jump; Grant Brown in the shot put and Cade Hewitt in the pole vault.
"We don't really have a weakness with this team," Spangler said. "Everybody does the best they can and we come out on top."
The Sacred Heart boys won only two events at the league meet but came home with eight gold medals, finishing first in both the 1,600 and 3,200-meter relays.
The Knights used the same four team members on both winning relays: senior David Faerber, juniors Nick Pahls and Scott Hartman, and sophomore Ryan Whelchel. That group shaved nearly 13 seconds off their previous best this season in the 3,200 relay.
"Our times in the 4x8 haven't been that great," Pahls said. "We lost Andrew Falcon, who was our best runner on that relay last year.
"But today felt really good. Scott and I dropped to a 2:05 for our splits, David dropped his time quite a bit and I'm really proud of Ryan. He's a 200, 400-meter guy and a jumper, so for him to step up in an 800-meter race is huge."
Russell finished second to Beloit in the boys team standings, with the Broncos led by the solid performance of sophomore Zach Axelson in the sprints. Axelson was matched against Lonberger in the 100 and 200 dashes, and had lost to the Minneapolis standout in both events in an early season meet in Belleville.
"That was really big for me," Axelson said. "Coming in I thought if I beat Lonberger, it would be a pretty good day for me no matter what place I got.
"In all of my workouts I've been working on the last 50 meters of the race, because that's where I die. But it was a lot better today."
Lonberger still had a successful day, finishing second to Axelson in the 100 and 200, along with his first-place finishes in the long jump and 400 dash.
Sacred Heart freshman Ally Balderston won two events in her first league track meet. In addition to winning the 800 run, Balderston was two seconds off the league record in the 1,600 run with her time of 5:27.69.
The Ellsworth girls had a pair of double winners, as senior Laura Macek took first in both the high jump and triple jump, and freshman Aleni Zavesky sprinted past the competition to win the 100 and 200 dashes.
©Salina Journal