By Brennan Stebbins (For OzarksSporsZone.com)
Last spring, Republic’s girls track and field team won its first conference championship in three decades. On Friday night at Joplin High School, the Tigers added another plaque to the trophy case.
Republic won eight events and scored in 16 while keeping Nixa at arm’s length most of the afternoon and the Tigers finished with 139.5 points, eighteen-and-a-half more than the Eagles, in winning back-to-back Central Ozark Conference championships.
“These girls got to experience this last year and saw how much fun that was to win that conference championship because we hadn’t won one in 30 years,” Republic coach Tori Mooneyham said. “To have them all back, they had a goal in mind coming into today and really not winning the championship was not an option for them because they had that feeling last year. We have 11 seniors and this is it for them, so they had that extra motivation going into this meet and they stepped into the challenge.”
It was a balanced effort from the Tigers, who scored big points in the distance events and relays on the track, and in the throws and jumps off it.
Kristin Probst, Gracie Woods, Reese Finley and Gracie Troester got the team off to a hot start by winning the 4×800 relay by more than 12 seconds with a time of 9:46.92. And Woods, Finley, Probst and Alaina Norman capped it all off by winning the 4×400 relay in 4:07.76.
In between, Troester, Norman and Jenna Belcher each won two individual events.
Troester was tops in the 1600 with a time of 5:11.77, and in the 3200 with a time of 11:34.64. Norman took home gold in the shot put with a distance of 11.41 meters, and in the javelin, with a throw of 41.68 meters. And Belcher was victorious in the long jump (5.60 meters) and in the triple jump (11.26 meters).
“We’ve got several of those star kids that score a lot of points, but what really did it was those kids who came in in those depth positions to score those extra points,” Mooneyham said. “We knew we had a chance, obviously winning last year, and I had almost everyone back and my senior class is pretty solid. We had a few areas we didn’t do as well as we thought, but we had some kids we weren’t expecting to place really step up and fill in those points we were missing. It was truly a team effort.”
The top eight finishers in each event scored team points.
Republic’s 4×200 relay of Woods, Finley, Brooklyn Douglas and Belcher finished second to score eight points. Finley placed second in the 400 to score eight more. The Tigers got 4.5 more in the 300 hurdles, with Chloe McCann placing fifth and Rilynn Finley tying for eighth. Troester and Probst went second and third in the 800 to score 14. Belcher was fifth in the 200 for 4.5 points. In the discus, Avery Rossow (4th) and Alison Poulson (5th) combined for nine points. Rossow took eighth in the shot put for another point. Norman and Woods went sixth and seventh in the long jump for five more. And Sienna Blankenship scored one in the pole vault with an eighth-place finish.
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“All of those that were picked to win, won, but it was some of those extra points we didn’t expect to get,” Mooneyham said. “That’s what’s so awesome about it, it was a team effort whether you won the event or pulled in a point in an eighth-place finish.”
Nixa, which finished comfortably in second place, only won two events on the girls side but scored the bulk of its points in the rest of the standings. Taylor Hopper was the champion in the 200-meter dash with a time of 25.88 to score 10 points, and Eva Williams won the pole vault for 10 more with a mark of 10–6.
Other top-three finishes for Nixa were Brookelyn Bidinger, Jenna Hefley, Brianna Bidinger and Eva Williams (3rd) in the 4×800 relay; Williams (2nd) in the 100 hurdles; Hopper (3rd) in the 100-meter dash; Hopper (3rd) in the 400; Ava Owens (2nd) in the discus; Rylee Eng (2nd) and Olivia Reed (3rd) in the long jump; Eng (2nd) in the triple jump; and Amelia White (3rd) in the javelin throw.
Willard champions were Madison Davis (14.99) in the 100 hurdles and in the 300 hurdles (47.13).
Carl Junction’s Sydney Ward won the 100-meter dash (12.21) and the 400 (58.07).
Ozark won the 4×200 relay with Jeneba Pyle, Bria Wright, Shelby Middleton and Ileana Naihe posting a time of 1:45.07. And Macy Humble was tops in the high jump (1.55 meters).
Joplin’s win came in the 4×100 relay with Phia Vogel, Abigayle Lowery, Abigail Eckert and Brylee Strickland finishing in 49.24 seconds.
Webb City’s Brooke Hedger won the 800 in 2:18.95.
Carthage’s Chasity Straw had the longest throw in the discus at 34.55 meters.
Nixa boys win big
The boys championship was decided well before the final events of the day, with Nixa amassing a huge lead and then finishing 65 points ahead of second-place Webb City
Nixa’s boys also won eight events and scored in 16, and the Eagles excelled in the throws, relays and distance events, especially.
Devon Kemp, Nicholas Flannery, Alexander Worthley and Aaron Ashley won the 4×800 relay in 8:01.27; Nixa’s 4×200 relay of Jaren Davis, Afton Hopkins, Caden Brown and Randy Flint won in 1:29.09; and the team’s 4×100 relay of Troy Huff, Davis, Austin Tate and Flint won with a time of 42.38 seconds. And the Eagles were second in the fourth relay, the 4×400, with Morgan Thompson, Brown, Devon Kemp and Spencer Ward running.
Throwers Jackson Cantwell and Hayden Mays dominated the discus and shot put, finishing first and second, respectively, in both. Cantwell tossed 58.57 meters in the discus, with Mays following with 56.29 meters. Cantwell reached a distance of 21.22 meters in the shot, and Mays reached 16.70 meters.
Flint, with a new PR, won the 200-meter dash in 22.21 seconds; Jaren Davis added a fifth-place finish. Davis won the long jump with a distance of 6.94 meters, and Afton Hopkins won the pole vault with a mark of 4.65 meters.
The Eagles, who finished in third place at the COC meet last year, also fared well in the 100-meter dash with Ward PR’ing in third place, Flint finishing sixth and Troy Huff PR’ing in seventh place for a combined 10.5 points. Aaron Ashley (2nd) and Logan Richart (5th) each scored in the 1600. Devon Kemp (4th), Alexander Worthley (7th) and Nicholas Flannery (8th) scored in the 800. Ashley (2nd), Reyes Martinez (3rd) and Zane Novinger (6th) scored in the 3200. Zernie Vess was third in the triple jump. Ward (5th), Morgan Thompson (6th) and Caden Brown (7th) scored in the 400. Aidan Ward took third in the javelin throw, and the school’s 4×400 relay earned second place.
Branson came away with three first-place finishes at the meet. Chris Vineyard won the 110 hurdles in 14.93 seconds and the 300 hurdles in 41.01 seconds; and Tristen Bough took first in the 800 in 1:57.19.
Neosho’s Noah Soriano won the 100-meter dash in 10.81 seconds. The Wildcats won the 4×400 relay (Isaiah Keezer, William Ebbinghaus, Phoenix Rhatigan, Izaiah Hill) in 3:26.44. And Hill won the 400 in 49.70 seconds.
Webb City’s gold medal winners were Evan Stevens (4:22.30) in the 1600, Stevens (9:34.80) in the 3200, and Tucker Liberatore (52.50 meters) in the javelin.
Ozark’s Napela Naihe won the high jump at 1.95 meters.
Carl Junction’s Ryder Pyles won the triple jump with a distance of 13.77 meters.
Girls team scores
Republic 139.50
Nixa 121
Ozark 85.50
Webb City 82
Carthage 81.50
Joplin 76
Willard 62
Carl Junction 59
Neosho 18.50
Branson 15
Boys team scores
Nixa 176.50
Webb City 109.50
Neosho 79.50
Branson 70
Republic 58
Joplin 55.50
Ozark 55.50
Carthage 49.50
Willard 47
Carl Junction 40
