CLARKSVILLE — The Rogersville City School girls added two more state titles to the trophy case on Saturday, and another Lady Warrior finished as a state runner-up, during the TMSAA Class A Track & Field Championships at Austin Peay State University’s Fortera Stadium.
Those top finishes helped catapult the Lady Warriors to a third-place finish in the state meet, just two points shy of collecting the state runner-up hardware.
Jonesborough, which competes in the same section as RCS, won the girls’ team title with 44 points. Meigs Magnet-Nashville finished second with 38 and RCS third with 36. Forty-six different girls’ teams scored points in the Class A standings; RCS had just eight girls qualify and compete in the state meet.
The RCS boys, with just five athletes competing, collected 14 points to finish 13th overall among 45 scoring teams.
Athletes from RCS, Rogersville Middle School and Surgoinsville Middle School competed in the Class A state championships, while athletes from Church Hill Middle School competed in the TMSAA Class AA state championships. A total of 23 Hawkins County athletes qualified for the state meet with their sectional performances.
To earn points for their teams, and to earn all-state honors, individuals or relays must finish in the top eight in the field of 16 qualifying competitors. RCS was the only Class A school to accrue points. CHMS, with just one athlete, picked up one point to finish 42nd overall.
HAIL TO THE CHAMPIONS
RCS eighth grader Emma Stipes did Hawkins County’s elite corps of throwers proud with a state championship in the Class A girls’ discus. She launched a throw of 89-2 to take top honors. She also made the podium in shot put, finishing seventh with a throw of 32-5, to earn all-state honors in both events.
Stipes said local throwers are like a family and “just loving on each other and creating a strong bond makes it fun.”
“It was fun. I didn’t have any PRs or anything, but I threw good enough to win,” said Stipes, who finished eighth in shot put in the state meet last year but didn’t even qualify in discus. “I just had a goal to do my best and have fun.”
The RCS girls’ relay team of Rylee Sivert, Anna Mae Boyd, Lilla Harrell and Kenady Deal slashed a whopping 12 seconds off their previous best time to set a new school record and claim the Class A state championship in the 4x400 relay with a time of 4:24.26. They also flirted with the state record, which stands at 4:23.97. All four Lady Warriors are seventh graders.
“It feels really good, especially since we were ranked fifth (coming in),” said Deal. “We PR’d by 12 seconds. Since the first day of practice, we’ve been working up to this moment.”
The girls said making coach Kelley Russell proud was a key motivator for them.
“She’s been pushing us all season, talking about how we got fourth last year” Sivert said. “So, we wanted to make her proud.”
“We worked all season for it,” Harrell said.
Boyd, who took up cross country and track for the first time this year, couldn’t stop smiling.
“It feels really good, especially since it’s my first year, to get off to a good start like this,” Boyd said.
PODIUM PRIZES
Harrell raced out of the gates to lead the first two laps of the Class A girls’ 800-meter run and kept pace to finish as the Class A state runner-up with a personal record time of 2:31.57. Eighth grader Katie Nichols of Tullahoma East won the event with a time of 2:25.98.
“I usually try to go fast for about half and then kind of settle into my pace,” said Harrell, who last fall earned all-state honors in cross country as well.
Sivert also claimed a spot on the podium in the Class A girls’ 400-meter run, finishing third in a time of 1:01.16.
On the boys’ side, RCS’ Brayden Brown made two podium appearances with a fourth-place finish in the Class A boys’ 800 with a time of 2:14.30 and a seventh-place finish in the Class A boys’ 1600 with a time of 5:08.37. Teammate Zander Harris finished fifth in the 800, as the two Warriors raced side-by-side down the stretch and across the finish line. Harris finished in a time of 2:14.32.
Brown shaved two seconds off his PR in the 800 and five seconds off his PR in the 1600, one of the state meet’s record-setting races. Burns’ Ayden Wilson set a blistering pace and finished in a meet record 4:47.98 to win the Class A boys’ 1600.
RCS eighth grader Aaron Munsey-Cooke also reached the podium to earn all-state honors with a sixth-place finish in the discus with a mark of 112-0. Munsey-Cooke, a dual qualifier, finished 10th in shot put (35-8).
In Class AA, Church Hill’s Bryson Christian made it to the podium with an eighth-place finish in the 200-meter run with a time of 24.08. The eighth-grade sprinter, who didn’t lose a race in his section this season, also finished 13th in the state in the 100 with a time of 11.88.
LOCAL FINISHES
RMS’ Riley Elkins just missed the podium in the Class A boys’ discus, finishing ninth with a mark of 107.4. He finished 11th in shot put (35-8).
RCS’ Elin Bryan finished 10th in the Class A girls’ 1600 with a time of 6:09.76. Surgoinsville’s Gracie Christian finished at No. 12 in the race with a time of 6:22.45.
RMS’ Travis Wade finished 10th in the Class A boys’ 1600 with a time of 5:24.05.
RCS’ Evan Laster finished 11th in the Class A boys’ 110 hurdles with a time of 17.78. He was also 14th in discus with a mark of 92-1.
SMS’ Chloe Fritts overcame a frustrating false start in the Class A girls’ 100 to finish 11th overall in a time of 13.77. A dual qualifier, Fritts finished 13th in the 200 with a time of 29.22.
The RCS relay team of Laster, Chance Pearson, Harris and Brown finished 11th in the Class A boys’ 4x400 with a time of 4:01.46.
The RCS relay team of Karlie Gray, Harlen Hayes, Boyd and Sivert overcame a fumbled exchange to finish 12th in the Class A girls’ 4x200 with a time of 1:57.21.
RMS seventh grader Jessabella Allen shaved two seconds off her PR to finish 13th in the Class A girls’ 800 with a time of 2:45.29.
CHMS’ Kylee Capson finished 14th in the Class AA girls’ long jump with a mark of 13-11.75.
The RMS relay team of William Ely, Landon Rimer, Justin Bradley and Elkins finished 14th in the Class A boys’ 4x100 with a time of 51.45. The winning team from Dalewood set a new meet record in the race with a time of 45.76.
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