ECC T&F CHAMPIONSHIPS - 3 individual titles, a relay win at ECC meet for Pirates

ECC T&F CHAMPIONSHIPS

Not deep enough to contend for team titles, the Gilman Pirates did what they could individually and put together an impressive showing at Tuesday’s Eastern Cloverbelt Track and Field Championships held at Colby High School.

The boys took fourth in the nine-team meet, earning three conference championships and three runner-up finishes along the way.

The girls were fifth. Claire Drier won the 100-meter high hurdles and was part of four top-three finishes in the meet. Bailey Angell was second in both throwing events and freshman Addy Vick jumped to two seconds.

Boys recap

Gilman’s boys scored 84 points in Tuesday’s meet to easily outscore Loyal (54), Spencer (50), Colby (48), Greenwood (8) and Granton (0). Neillsville won its fourth straight team championship with 165 points, 12 better than Owen-Withee, and Columbus Catholic was third with 128 points.

Chad Konsella was a key part of Gilman’s success. The junior was named the confer- ence’s long jump champion, going 20 feet, 7 inches. With a better second-best jump, Konsella won the tiebreaker over Neillsville’s Cameron Kennedy. Both got their best jumps in the preliminary round. Sawyer Winger, who also had a strong night for the Pirates was fifth at 191. Konsella’s jump was a season-best by a quarter-inch. Gilman Logan Halida was 15th at 16-0.5.

Konsella also made an impact in the 100-meter dash, taking second in the final at a personal-best 11.74 seconds. He missed the conference title by 0.02 seconds, trailing Neillsville’s Brody Bergmann. He was 0.01 seconds faster than Owen-Withee’s Vincent Henke. Brady McAlpine got the eighth-place point for Gilman 12.35 seconds. McAlpine was faster in the prelims at 12.25 seconds. James Wojcik was 10th for Gilman at 12.82 seconds.

To top it off, Konsella was part of Gilman’s winning 1,600-meter relay team and runner-up 800-meter relay.

The 1,600-meter team closed the meet by taking a close race with Columbus Catholic. Konsella, Halida, McAlpine and Winger finished in 3:46.16, 1.36 seconds ahead of the Dons. Neillsville was a distant third at 3:58.6. Those same four runners almost got it done in the 4x200 as well. They were timed at 1:38.1, 0.52 seconds behind Owen-Withee and 0.56 seconds ahead of third-place Neillsville.

Freshman Taydyn Angell won Gilman’s third championship. His late-season surge in the shot put continued with his first 40-feet throw, 40-2 to be exact, to win by a comfortable margin over Loyal’s Jaden Smith (38-3.25). Senior Caleb Marion added three points with a sixth-place toss of 34-6, his best of the season. Elijah Madlon was 12th for Gilman at 26-8. Marion was fourth in the discus at 110-1 and Angell was seventh at 104-8. Those were both season-best distances as well. Lucky Laessig of Columbus Catholic won at 122-2, earning the tiebreak over Owen-Withee’s Sullivan Poehler.

Winger won the tiebreaking process for the second-place award in the high jump as he was credited with a jump of 5-10.01 to get ahead of Colby freshman Xander Buchanan. Winger had hit 5-10 one other time during the season, back in the April 11 outdoor opener. He finished 4 inches behind winner Ashten Schultz of Neillsville. Gilman’s Max Ustianowski got the eighth-place point by clearing 5-2 and Trevor Vick was ninth at 5 feet.

Senior Quintin Franzen was fifth in both hurdles events. He finished the 300-meter intermediates at 48.72 seconds, just ahead of Ustianowski, who was sixth at 48.95 seconds. Schultz won in 43.36 seconds. Franzen ran the 110-meter highs in 19.14 seconds, 0.01 seconds behind fourth-place Zion Jones of Neillsville. Schultz won that race too in 15.87 seconds.

Ustianowski, Vick, Wyatt Orth and Angell gave Gilman three more points with a sixth-place finish in the 400-meter relay at 52.75 seconds. They beat Greenwood by 1.54 seconds. Neillsville won in 45.7 seconds.

Vick was ninth in the triple jump at 363.25, 8.75 inches away from scoring, while Mitchell Moran (30-5.5) was 12th. Moran took a big cut in time in the 1,600-meter run while taking ninth in 5:45.13 and he was 11th in the 800-meter run at 2:37.76. Wojcik was 10th (26.75) and Orth was 12th (27.53) in the 200-meter dash.

Girls recap

Gilman’s girls scored 86 points in Tuesday’s meet to far exceed Columbus Catholic (36.333), Spencer (32.333), Greenwood (17) and Granton (11). Loyal successfully defended its 2023 title by scoring 152 points, 18 more than Neillsville. Colby (120.333) and Owen-Withee (109) were third and fourth.

Drier’s 24 individual points were led by her efforts in the hurdles. The junior’s win in the 100-meter highs came with a personal-best time of 17.28 seconds in the final, 0.15 seconds ahead of Neillsville’s Gracie Schoengarth and 0.17 seconds ahead of Owen-Withee’s Cassidy Graski. Rilla Syryczuk was ninth for Gilman in 19.37 seconds.

In the 300-meter low hurdles, Drier finished in 49.17 seconds, 0.04 seconds behind champion Kendall Weiler of Owen-Withee and 3.03 seconds ahead of Neillsville’s Madi Davel.

Gilman got 14 points in the long jump, eight of which came from Vick’s runner-up jump at 15-10. Drier was 2 inches behind her in third place. Vick missed the title by an inch as Neillsville’s Kaylee Lawrence went 15-11. Drier got third by a half-inch over Neillsville’s Ava Miller. Kyra Rabuck was 15th for Gilman at 13 feet.

Vick, who had never high jumped before mid-March, is this year’s conference runner-up in that event too. She cleared a new personal-best height of 4-10 and was 2 inches behind champion Addysen Wolf of Loyal. Jaylen Copenhaver hit 4-4 and took sixth. In her second triple jump competition of the spring, Vick was fourth at an improved 31-4.5, 5.5 inches behind winner Summer Smith of Loyal. Pirates Patricia Kloss (29-1) and Aubrey Mann (2710) were 10th and 13th.

The team of Copenhaver, Drier, Patricia Kloss and Vick earned Gilman’s highest relay finish. They were second in the 800-meter race at 1:54.34, 1.36 seconds behind Loyal. The Pirates were 1.6 seconds ahead of third-place Spencer.

Bailey Angell and Colby’s Daelyn Rieck were the clear leaders in the throws. Angell threw 105-3 in the discus to handily beat third-place Hope Peroshek of Loyal (91-4) and threw 32-7.75 in the shot put to get by third-place Lydia Lobacz of Owen-Withee (29-9). Rieck won with throws of 129-10 and 38-5.25. Gilman’s Rilla Syryczuk threw a personal-best 29-2.5 to take fifth in the shot put, while Mann was 15th at 20-11.25. Gilman’s Kylee Copenhaver (65-6) and Mann (58-6) were 13th and 16th in discus.

Jaylen Copenhaver had a time of 13.94 seconds in the 100-meter dash preliminaries that seeded her fifth for the final. That’s where she stayed with a time of 14.02 seconds. Wolf won in 13.3 seconds. Rabuck (14.85) and Kylee Copenhaver (14.86) were 13th and 14th. Kloss (29.75) and Syryczuk (30.08) got the seventh- and eighth-place points in the 200-meter dash, while Rabuck (31.44) was 12th.

Three points went to the 400-meter relay team of Rabuck, Syryczuk, Mann and Kylee Copehaver, which took sixth in 56.96 seconds. Loyal won that race in 52.88 seconds.

On to regionals

Next up for Gilman is the start of WIAA Division 3 post-season competition. The first step is the regional meet, which the Pirates will host Monday with the first events set to start at 4 p.m.

Gilman, Rib Lake Abbotsford, Athens, Cadott, Chetek-Weyerhaeuser, Cornell-Lake Holcombe, McDonell Central, New Auburn, Owen-Withee, Prentice and Thorp are scheduled to attend the meet where the top four finishers in each event will advance to sectional competition.

Cameron will host the sectional on May 23. Competition there will start at 3 p.m. and the top four in each event will qualify for state.