Tallier wins her three events, girls nearly win Northern Badger

GILMAN TRACK & FIELD

Gracie Tallier had a big day with three event victories, while Bailey Angell and Claire Drier both posted secondplace finishes during Gilman’s near-win on the girls side of Saturday’s Northern Badger Small School Classic hosted by UW-Stout.

The Pirates finished with 50 points to take second place out of 28 scoring teams. Gilman was one point behind Eastern Cloverbelt rival Colby and five ahead of third-place Ladysmith.

Tallier, a junior, scored 30 of those points with her three wins. In fact, Tallier and Drier took the top two spots in the long jump competition, which featured 56 entrants. Tallier won it with a leap of 15 feet, 8.75 inches, while Drier went 15-6.75 to finish comfortably ahead of thirdplace finisher Shaylee Stokes of Prairie Farm, who jumped 14-9.75.

Those two Pirates also scored in the 200-meter dash. Tallier won the 25th and final heat in 27.62 seconds, which wound up being the best time of the day by a solid margin. Ladysmith’s Holly Rands won the 23rd heat but was second overall in 28.33 seconds. Drier was second in the 24th heat at 28.68 seconds, but that was still good for fifth overall out of 90 sprinters, just behind the winner of her heat, Madison Wall of Cameron (28.49). Stokes was third in 28.47 seconds.

Early in the meet, Tallier won the 55-meter dash final in 7.63 seconds after also earning the top preliminary time out of 99 entrants in 7.72 seconds. Tallier again held off Stokes in the final, this time by 0.14 seconds, while Shell Lake’s Maddie Naglosky was third in 7.82 seconds.

Angell made her season debut in the shot put and the 2021 state qualifier got off to a good start. Her best throw of the day covered 35 feet, 2 inches and was 10.75 inches better than her top throw from last spring. She was just 5.5 inches behind winner Tori Thorpe, a sophomore from Ladysmith, and 2 feet ahead of third-place finisher Jeanette Hydukovich, a sophomore from Colfax.

Pirate Emma Grunseth was 34th out of 61 entrants at 23-5.5.

Drier added an 11th-place finish in the 55-meter hurdles at 10.85 seconds and freshman Jaylen Copenhaver was 23rd in the 400-meter dash at 1:13.61.

Prescott was fourth in the team standings with 39.5 points, while Byron, Minn. (36), Barron (32), Flambeau (27), Turtle Lake-Clayton (26), Prairie Farm (26) and Cameron (25) rounded out the top 10 girls teams.

Gilman had one scorer in the boys meet. Senior Dominic Franzen scored four points by taking fifth in the 200-meter dash at 24.04 seconds. He was third in his heat behind Carter Kummet of Chetek- Weyerhaeuser (23.91) and Ben Dickinsen of Augusta (24.02). Ashton Kummet of Chetek-Weyerhaeuser (23.49) and Caden Healy of Colby (23.79) were the top two finishers overall.

Pirates Troy Duellman (26.56) and Braeden Person (27.26) were 48th and 65th out of 95 entrants.

Franzen just missed making the final in the 55-meter dash. He took ninth in the preliminaries at 7.02 seconds, falling one spot and 0.02 seconds shy of making the final, which was won by Healy in 6.71 seconds. Duellman was 54th in 7.67 seconds.

Quintin Franzen was 29th for Gilman in the 55-meter hurdles at 11.46 seconds. Person was 33rd (1:02.85), while Brady McAlpine (1:03.64) was 37th in the 400-meter dash. Freshman Mitchell Moran was 35th in the 800-meter run at 2:45.72. Zack Marion got off a throw of 33-10.5 to place 26th in the shot put, while Bryce Chovan was 45th at 28-8.5.

The team of Duellman, Quintin Franzen, Person and McAlpine took 22nd out of 27 teams in the 1,600-meter relay with a time of 4:26.95.

The Pirates tied Spooner for 23rd place in the team standings out of 30 scoring teams. Chetek-Weyerhaeuser eked out a 54-53 margin over Prescott for the team title, while Colby (43), Athens (37) and Shell Lake (36) rounded out the top five.

Gilman is next scheduled to move outdoors for an April 7 meet at Augusta.