By GARLAND KENNEDY
Sentinel Sports Editor
With some experienced athletes returning and others trying their hand as freshmen, Sitka High’s track and field teams ran away with first-place finishes in many individual events at the track meet Friday and Saturday at Lower Moller Field.
Both the girls and the boys teams finished first in team points.
The Lady Wolves squad took first by a full 45-point margin in competition with Juneau-Douglas, Thunder Mountain, Gustavus, Craig and Ketchikan. On the boys’ side, Sitka won the meet with a 53-point lead over second place Thunder Mountain and outdid Juneau by 111 points.
Sitka High’s track and field seniors pose for a photo over the weekend at Lower Moller Field. From the left are Kanen Alley-Jarquin, Emily Blackmon, Dimitri Bennet, James Helem, Jeremia Ferguson, David Davis, Deszerei Chong, Anna Prussian, Angelo Elefante, Tyler Adres, Camden Young, Caleb Hutton and Jack Mickelson. (Sentinel photo)
Sitka sophomore Clare Mullin took first in the 800-meter race in 2:32, and teammate Marina Dill was third. Mullin also claimed first place in the 1,600 run, crossing the line in 5:45. Sitka senior Anna Prussian was 4 seconds behind for second place, and Dill finished three seconds after Prussian to complete the Sitka team’s sweep of that event.
In the long 3,200, Prussian was second in 12:02.
Though she’s new to the sport, freshman sprinter Emma Heuer took second place in the 100-meter dash in 14.06 seconds and was third in the 200-meter race in 29.82. In both events, she was the first Sitkan across the finish line.
“I feel like I did pretty good, being that I’m a freshman,” Heuer said at practice Monday. “It’s been a great experience and definitely a learning experience and I still have a lot to improve and learn on, but I think it’s been good to try a bunch of new things.”
Heuer also ran in the four-by-100 meter relay with Adalyna Moore, Leilynn Swain and Jadelynn Kubik. The squad took second in 1:00.14, half a second behind Ketchikan and a fifth of a second ahead of Sitka’s other team in the event.
In the high jump, Heuer earned third place. Looking forward, she hopes to improve her jumping form, along with her speed. She said she took up running only this year, encouraged by senior Anna Prussian.
“I enjoy the competition for sure and being able to travel and have all of the experiences,” Heuer said.
Another Sitka freshman, Natalie Hall, leapt headfirst into sprints and field events this year, crossing the line in the 200-meter sprint in 29.94, only a blink behind Heuer. Hall also finished second in the 300 meter hurdles and ran in the Lady Wolves’ victorious four-by-400 relay team with Marina Dill, Jadelynn Kubik and Clare Mullin with a time of 4:53, less than a second ahead of Ketchikan.
“I think it went pretty well,” Hall said afterward. “I mean, the freshmen are still figuring out track meets in general, and pacing and how to just pace yourself during sprints and things. We’re all still learning.”
While she planned to run distance events in track after running with the cross country team in the fall, Hall’s track debut was in the sprints.
In the long jump she beat her personal best by a full 7.5 inches.
“I would like to keep doing long jump, hopefully… I would really like to get better at the hurdles, work on form and try to cut down that time,” she said.
Running and jumping performance aside, Hall enjoys the social side of the team, which is about 80 strong.
“All the people are really great,” she said. “Honestly, it’s so much fun. I’ve got some great friends here. And what’s really nice about it is we have a lot of freshmen... and we really all push each other. Everyone just pushes each other a lot, especially freshmen… The weather is probably the hardest part, like going outside when it’s rainy – it sucks.”
In shot put, Kanen Alley-Jarquin placed second. Ava Brady was third, Elise Brady was fourth and Madison Dill was fifth. Alley-Jarquin won the discus event, with Sadija Masic in second and Ava Brady in fourth.
The Sitka boys logged strong performances in many events, with the top team score among the six Southeast teams present.
Sophomore Annan Weiland won the 800 in 2:16, with classmate Trey Demmert less than a second behind. In the 1,600 meter run Sitka swept the top four spots, with senior Silas Demmert first across the line in 4:57, his brother Trey in second place 2 seconds later, Weiland in third at an even 5 minutes, and Connor Hitchcock in fourth in 5:02.
Some of the Wolves’ top runners compete in the 800 meter race, Saturday in Sitka. From the left are Trey Demmert, Annan Weiland and Connor Hitchcock. Weiland won the race and Demmert took second. (Sentinel photo)
In the 3,200-meter race, Silas Demmert again was the winner, this time in 10:07, while Hitchcock was second across the line in 10:33.
In the 400-meter sprint, Dezi Olney-Miller was the first Sitka runner across the line, placing third in 57.34 seconds. Camden Young was just a second behind. In the 200, freshman Calder Prussian took third in 26.06, with Olney-Miller at his heels. In just 12.33 seconds, senior Caleb Hutton took fourth in the 100; Emilio Partido came in fifth and Prussian sixth.
For veteran distance runner Trey Demmert, the home meet was a chance to stretch his legs in the 400-meter dash, a new event for him.
“That’s just something I really wanted to do. It’s the funnest one to watch, and I figured why not be good at the funnest one to watch,” he said.
“I was gassed right away, like in the first 100 meters I could feel my stride falling apart and then I was just working my hardest for the next 200 meters just to try to get around that curve, and then the last 100 meters, I could not sprint at all,” Demmert recalled. “I’m like trying to sprint and my legs are just going right in front of each other.”
In the preliminary event he finished eighth in 1:01 and aims to break the one-minute mark this season.
“I want to get good at it,” he said. “And so that’s definitely something I want to work on. And the mile felt good – me and my guys went one, two, three and four. So that was definitely a good thing. Silas – he was even sick all week– and then he still got first and I was happy for that.”
In the final 400-meter race, Dezi Olney-Miller placed third in 57.34 and Camden Young was fifth in 58.69 seconds.
In the 300-meter hurdles, David Davis was second, with Angelo Elefante third. In the four-by-100 relay, Davis, Dezi Olney-Miller, Zander Dumag and Emilio Partido finished second in 50.03 seconds.
Hank Maxwell, Weiland, Olney-Miller and Camden Young ran the four-by-400 relay in four minutes, taking first place in the process.
In the shot put, Caleb Hutton placed third and Silas Ferguson fourth.
Rowan Olney-Miller, a sophomore, won the high jump and Emilio Partido finished second.
Though the season is still young, coach Jeremy Strong likes the look of the team so far.
“Really strong in the region,” he summarized. “We’ve been beating all the 4A schools, the bigger schools, so they’re right about where they need to be. I think at this time of the season, progression-wise (the team is) just kind of building confidence.”
On one hand, he noted, the team has a large contingent of seniors, and on the other, there are a lot of freshmen.
The Wolves will have this weekend off, but race in Ketchikan in two weeks. Until then, the coach will continue fine-tuning their running skills.
“We want to make sure that when we get to the meets, we feel comfortable with the movements and we have trained hard enough to put ourselves in a position to really give good efforts and not have to be stressed out about the little things,” said Strong.
