Fast Times and Deep Competition In 4A Region 3

FHSAA 4A Region 3
Bill Fay

On-Site Coverage

Meet Recap by Bill Fay

Sunny weather and clear skies prevailed at the 4A Region 3 meet Thursday. A fresh breeze kept the heat down to a tolerable level, and cooled things off later in the meet after the sun went down. Some really memorable performances were turned in at the meet.
 


On the girls' side, two of the top sprinters in the state went head to head in both the 100 and 200. Boyd Anderson senior Kali Davis-White and St. Thomas Aquinas sophomore Krystal Sparling duked it out in both events, with the elder Davis-White getting the better of her with times of 11.76 and 23.76 to Sparling's 11.80 and 23.78. The finals of the 3A State Championship Friday night at UNF will feature these two ladies once again. Davis-White has already been invited to the Dream 100 in New York City, a drop in time and win could give Sparling a chance as well.
 
 
Sparling's teammate Kendall Ellis scored some points in the 200 for the Raiders, but before she did that shined in her event the 400 meter dash. Ellis ran a new personal best time of 53.80, the second fastest time in the state, and sixth fastest time in the nation.  Four other girls finished under 57 seconds in an incredible quarter mile. Nova senior Aiyanna Stiverne was second. She also finished fifth in the 100 meter dash, just missing out on a trip to state in that event.

 
In the second heat of the 4x800 meter relay, all the usual suspects were going at it, but Seminole Ridge, who was looking good going into the meet, having won the County meet, and the district meet was bringing up the rear. I had been to both of those meets, and I knew that senior Michelle Howell had the speed to get it done, but it was a beautiful thing to watch. She took the baton in last place, and within the first 100m was in 5th. The rest of the first lap was bridging the gap to the 3rd and 4th place runners 30m ahead, and she managed to hold on to 3rd place by a hair at the finish. She then followed up later as regional champ with a 2:12 in the open 800.
 
Morgan Hull of Palm Beach Central learned to hang with the big dogs in the 1600, her 5:14 a PR by 11 seconds, 2 seconds from the leaders and good for 4th and a state berth behind Katherine MacNeal of Cypress Bay and a duo from St. Thomas at 5:12. 
 
One of the gutsiest runners who did not make it to state was freshman Amber Pearce, of Jupiter, who anchored Jupiter’s 5th place 4x800m relay team, and took 5th place in the 1600 and 3200. Look for her to leave her own mark the next few years. Jupiter’s senior Courteney Zboyan had a taste of the competition to come. After running solo the second half of her wins most of this season, she had to fight for her 4th place qualifying berth in the 3200.
 
St. Thomas Aquinas flexed their muscle scoring 185 points. Boyd Anderson was second with 126 and Seminole Ridge was third wiht 43 points.
 
 
On the boys' side, Christopher Grinley of Park Vista has been one of the top hurdlers in the state for the past few years, but this year has been a slow start for him, with nagging injury problems. He has been returning to form the second half of the season, and ran a 38.04 300m effort at districts, near his best of 37.3 or so. I talked to him before the events about his fitness at districts, and he seemed ready to rock. In the 100m hurdles he came back form a solid 14.32 in the prelims to PR at 13.86 in the finals, out front and clearly in control. After a solid 38.18 300m prelim, he nearly caught his hair on fire with a 36.29 blast, in a different zip code from the other runners. He is the only one in the state under 37, and #2 ranked nationally with this performance.
 
 
Park Vista put up a solid performance in the 4x800m performance with senior Yephnick Adelphonse coming from near the back of the pack , closing a big gap, and fighting for the lead down the homestretch before fading to third.

 
The boys 1600 went out fast and stayed that way with PRs for the top 4 between 4:22and 4:26.Matthew Butler of ST and Anthony Deleva of Coral Glades led the charge, with Tyler Bell of Coral Springs and Charlie Bengston of JIL rounding out the qualifiers. This was Bell’s first loss of the season, and a 5 second PR for Charlie. The Boys 800m was another really exciting race with less than 1 1/2 seconds separating 2nd from 7th and 4th thru 7th place separated by only .11 seconds. As close a finish as you will see, with runners falling at the finish.


 
 
In the boys 3200, it looked like a battle shaping up between top seeds William Fay of Atlantic, and Salvador Medrano of John I Leonard. The two had not raced this season, and Fay had been undefeated in the 3200 this year, with wins at regular season meets, as well as Conference, County, and District Championships. Salvador has returned to top form recently, and showed it as he was out hard from the gun, getting a 40 to 50 yard gap on the chase group by 800m. The group began to string out by 1600m with Medrano at 4:40, JIL’s Bengston and the 2 ST boys at 4:45, and Fay in 7th place at 4:50. Fay, who had started back in the field the first mile, continued to pick off runners until he had moved into 3rd place with 900m to go, still 40 yards back. He began to bridge the gap to Alexander Haugen as Haugen slowly reeled Medrano in, and with 200 to go, Fay moved into second and went into a full kick to catch Medrano just ahead. 3166jpg Coming off the final turn, they were only a stride apart, but Medrano still had enough juice to hold off Fay, 9:42.3 to 9:42.8. Haugen and Cruz of ST made the cut also. PR’s for all. Check out the videos of the three boys distance races, they are fun to watch.

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St. Thomas Aquinas completed the sweep of the team titles by winning the boys championship as well with 112.50 points. Miramar was second (62 points) and Park Vista was third (58 points).
 
Congratulations to all the state qualifiers—we’ll see you again next week.

Race Video by rikb

 

 

 

 

 

 

Elite Performances

 

Girls Highlights

Boys Highlights