Rosemount boys earn 16th finals bid
The Lakeville South and Eagan girls teams automatically qualified for the state True Team track and field finals after winning section meets Tuesday. Also advancing is the Rosemount boys team, which will pursue its fifth Class 3A championship.
State True Team Class 3A finals are Friday, May 17, at Stillwater High School. All boys and girls section team champions advance, with four wild-card teams from each division added to the field later this week.
Class 3A, Section 1
The Lakeville South girls won by more than 170 points over runner-up Lakeville North in Tuesday’s section meet at Lakeville South High School. Farmington was eighth in the 10-team field.
Mankato East, which moved up to Class 3A this season, won the Section 1 boys team championship by 26 points over Owatonna. Lakeville South was fourth, Lakeville North seventh and Farmington eighth.
South’s girls won three events – two by senior Alexa Drew – but in keeping with the True Team theme, won the team championship thanks to numerous high finishes. A case in point was junior Avery Sandmann, who didn’t have a first place but scored the most points in individual events of any athlete in the meet, female or male.
Sandmann placed second in the 300-meter hurdles (48.29 seconds), fourth in the triple jump (35 feet, 1.25 inches), fourth in the 100 hurdles (16.42 seconds) and fifth in the long jump (16-5.25). She scored 109 points on her own, three more than Mankato East’s Lexi Heminover.
Drew took first in the long jump in 12.44 seconds and was the long jump winner at 17-2.5. Eva Welsch won the 100 hurdles in 15.28.
Lakeville South will make its 13th consecutive trip to the state girls True Team finals. The Cougars have won four Class 3A True Team championships, the most recent in 2016.
Lakeville North’s girls picked up a relay victory in the 4x100, clocking in at 49.84 seconds. Panthers senior Trinity Wilson won the shot put at 41-9, the longest reported throw in the state this season. Wilson added a third place in the shot put, and her 58 points made her the highest-scoring field event athlete in the girls meet.
Farmington senior Mariah Fenske won the girls 1,600 in 5:07.80. Marianah Scott, also a senior, finished second in the 100, third in the 400 and sixth in the 200, making her the section meet’s top scorer in track events with 82 points.
Event winners in the Section 1 boys meet included McKenzie Donlan of Farmington in the 400 (50.45), Darby Griffin of Lakeville North in the 800 (1:56.52) and the Lakeville North boys 4x800 relay (7:58.59).
Class 3A, Section 3
Rosemount, Shakopee and Prior Lake were the top three teams in the Section 3 boys meet at Rosemount High School and the only three to exceed 1,000 points. The Irish finished 73 points ahead of Shakopee to earn their 16th berth in the state True Team finals and sixth in a row. Rosemount has won four boys state True Team championships, including back-to-back titles in 2021 and 2022.
Eastview (fourth), Apple Valley (sixth) and Burnsville (ninth) also were in the 10-team boys Section 3 field.
Rosemount won five events in the section boys meet, including a victory by senior Kwabena Yawson in the 100 dash in 10.68 seconds. Second in 10.74 was Irish senior Riddik Collier. Also taking first were junior William Riddel in the discus (156 feet, 1 inch), senior Noah Rodenwald in the pole vault (13-6), senior Aidan Kough in the shot put (51-5) and the 4x100 relay (42.85).
The Irish scored at least 70 points in nine of the 14 non-relay events, which usually requires having three people place in the top 10. They picked up 79 points in the high jump with Ehinome Ejodamen finishing second, Torgeson Ketterling fifth and Daniel Jeter seventh.
Eastview senior Samuel Ngando finished in the top three in two field events, taking second in the long jump at 20-8 and third in the triple jump at 42-6. Levi Ruyle, a junior, placed fifth in both hurdles races.
Apple Valley senior Dwyne Smith Jr. was first in the 200- and 400-meter races. His winning times were 21.51 in the 200 – the fastest reported time in the state this year – and 47.12 in the 400. Two weeks ago, Smith set an all-time state record of 46.93 in the 400 at the Hamline Elite Meet.
Eagles sophomore Quieris Barnslater won the 110 hurdles in 15.43 and was sixth in the 300 hurdles.
Burnsville junior Albert Ongwenyi was second to Apple Valley’s Smith in two sprints, running the 200 in 22.03 and the 400 in 49.83. Caleb Kamara, a Blaze sophomore, tied Ongwenyi for second in the 200, also running 22.03, and was third in the 100 in 10.80.
Prior Lake scored 1,101 points to Rosemount’s 1,073 in the girls Section 3 meet. Eastview took third with 977. Apple Valley and Burnsville placed eighth and ninth.
Rosemount’s total appears to give the Irish a good shot at a wild-card invitation to the state finals. The Irish won three events and had second-place finishers in five others. The Irish’s highest-scoring event was the long jump, where three athletes placed in the top six to collect 82 team points.
Senior Cassandra Gospodarek cleared 5-4 to win the high jump and led the Irish in the long jump with a second-place effort of 17-2.25. Summer Davis, a senior, cleared 10-9 to win the pole vault. Rosemount’s girls also came in first in the 4x200 relay in 49.24.
Rosemount senior Kendall Grate was second in the 100 and 200, and sophomore Sarah Labarere added a second place in the 300 hurdles. Skylar Heimerl finished second in the triple jump.
Eastview had three top-10 finishers in the girls 3,200, led by section winner Natalie Wees, a senior who was timed in 11 minutes, 21.40 seconds. Ninth-grader Kienna Loberg finished second and junior Gracie Puit came in ninth. Also winning an event was Eastview senior Vanessa Wright, who threw the discus 113-10. Wright added a fourth place in the shot put.
Burnsville sophomore Carley LaMotte ran 5:03.10 in the 1,600, winning the event by more than 20 seconds.
Class 3A, Section 2
Eagan’s girls earned a bid to the state True Team finals for the 10th time overall and eighth since 2008 after winning the Section 2 meet at Wildcat Stadium.
Event winners for the Wildcats included Lilah Bartels in the 3,200 meters, Ava Ligtenberg in the 800, Aadra Peterson in the shot put and the 4x800 relay team. On the boys side, senior Blake Koenen won the 100- and 200-meter sprints and Tyler Botz took first in the 110 hurdles.
Stillwater, White Bear Lake, East Ridge, Hastings, Park of Cottage Grove, Tartan and Woodbury also competed in the Section 2 meet.
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