Wyoming Area state qualifer Jenesa Sancho wins in the Girls Class 3A 300 hurdles final.
Fred Adams | For Times Leader
Wyoming Area’s Lucia Campenni wins her heat in the Girls Class 3A 100 hurdles prelims.
Fred Adams | For Times Leader
Abington Heights’ Aliya Lucarelli wins her heat in the Girls Class 3A 200 dash.
Fred Adams | For Times Leader
Crestwood’s anchor Riley Ruch takes the hand off from Katie Kozich in the Girls Class 3A 3200 relay on her way to winning the final Monday at Scranton Memorial Stadium.
Fred Adams | For Times Leader
Lake-Lehman anchor Ava Jones waits for the baton hand off from Cameron Janick in the Class 2A Girls 3200 relay final Monday afternoon at Scranton Memorial Stadium.
Fred Adams | For Times Leader
SCRANTON — Though it’s Abington Heights sitting at the top of the Class 3A girls leaderboard after the opening day of the District 2 Track and Field Championships, several Wyoming Valley Conference schools have already begun to strike gold in a very balanced field to start things off.
Four different WVC schools got to the top of the medal stand, with Crestwood in second place and Wyoming Area in third as the district meet got underway Monday at Scranton Memorial Stadium.
Hanover Area and Nanticoke Area also scored one win each, Symone Mims in the shot put and Nevaeh Baran in the triple jump, and in the Class 2A division Lake-Lehman added a win in the 3200 relay.
It was a WVC sweep of the girls’ long-distance relays to start the finals portion of the meet, with Lake-Lehman defending its title in the Class 2A race and Crestwood triumphing in the Class 3A event.
The two schools entered the relay in different positions on the rundown: the Black Knights were favored heavily to repeat, while Crestwood was seeded in third with a time 10 seconds behind first seed Abington Heights.
The Comets didn’t just overperform their seed, they outclassed the whole field. A time of 9:35.27 brought Crestwood to the finish line 12 seconds ahead of Abington Heights to win the gold.
“Going into it, we were nervous … we did a lot of team huddles and deep breathing, it helped calm the nerves,” said Katie Kozich, the lone senior on the Crestwood relay.
Abington Heights would rebound later in the day with a 3200 run win from Anna Pucilowski and a gold in the pole vault from Kiana Seid to take control of the team race heading into Tuesday’s events.
Elsewhere on the track, Wyoming Area’s season-long success in the hurdles continued as sophomore Jenesa Sancho won gold in the 300 hurdles, and her teammate Lucia Campenni took the silver medal right behind her.
Earlier in the meet, the two Warriors finished second and third in the prelims for Tuesday’s 100 hurdles finals.
With the gold on the line in the longer race, Sancho found enough in the gas tank to hold off Campenni by just over a second for her first career district championship.
“It’s definitely very difficult, it gets very tiring so I have to push through it,” Sancho said. “I wanted to break the record, it didn’t happen but I still did my best.”
The Warriors added another medal with Taylor Gashi’s silver in the discus, and a sixth-place medal from the 3200 relay.
In the field events, Mims was seeded way down the list in the Class 3A shot put but launched a 36 foot, 2.25 inch bomb to run away with the gold for Hanover Area.
The circumstances were quite different for Baran in the triple jump; the Nanticoke Area senior was not only the defending champ in the event, but her winning jump of 40 feet, four inches set a new meet record last season.
She didn’t quite reach that record distance but very comfortably repeated as champ with a 39-11 jump, more than three feet further than Gashi in second place.
“I think it takes a lot of preparation, it needs to all come together on one day,” Baran said. “I only got two jumps in, so hopefully I could rest up and get better jumps at states.”
In Class 2A, Lake-Lehman’s win in the 3200 relay was the only gold medal for the WVC as the top of the team leaderboard was dominated by the Lackawanna Conference after the opening events.
Montrose sits in first with 62 points, running away from the field with Western Wayne in second at 38.5 points.
Holy Redeemer is the top WVC team in the standings in fifth place, followed by Lake-Lehman in sixth. Redeemer senior Bella Boylan won the silver medal in the high jump and a bronze in the javelin.
In addition to the relay win, Lake-Lehman’s Meghan Griffith put together a strong finishing stretch to chase down a silver medal in the 3200 run.
District 2 Girls Championships
(at Scranton Memorial Stadium)
CLASS 3A GIRLS
Team Scores – 1. Abington Heights (AH) 45, 2. Crestwood (Cr) 30, 3. Wyoming Area (WA) 29, 4. North Pocono (NP) 22 ½, 5. Hazleton Area (Haz) 20 ½, 6. Delaware Valley (DV) 17, 7. Honesdale (Hon) 14, 8. Nanticoke (Nan) 13, 9. Hanover Area (Han) 10, 10. Pittston Area (PA) 7, 11. Wallenpaupack (Wal) 6, 12. Wilkes-Barre Area (WBA) 5, 13. Dallas (Dal) 4, 13. Berwick (B) 4, 13, Valley View (VV) 4, Tunkhannock (T) 3.
3200 Relay – 1. Crestwood (Alyssa Leicht, Sophia Kwarcinski, Katie Kozich, Riley Ruch) 9:35.27, 2. Abington Heights 9:47.60, 3. Wallenpaupack 9:52.08, 4. Hazleton Area 10:19.74, 5. Valley View 10:26.23, 6. Wyoming Area 10:29.26, 7. Berwick 10:36.90, 8. Delaware Valley 10:38.61.
300 Hurdles – 1. Jenesa Sancho (WA) 46.26, 2. Lucia Campenni (WA) 47.78, 3. Elizabeth Moore (NP) 47.89, 4. Sophia Kwarcinski (Cr) 48.44, 5. Julia Schuster (AH) 48.63, 6. Celia 2DeCesare (NP) 49.31, 7, Penelope Serrano (N) 49.69, 8. Sofia Mirza (AH) 49.81.
3200 Run – 1. Anna Pucilowski (AH) 10:46.65, 2. Grace Holderith (DV) 10:49.89*, 3. Mollie Kozich (Cr) 11:31.03, 4. Adrienne Shebelock (Cr) 11:33.27, 5. Marley Gilboy (AH) 11:41.95, 6. Evolette Reinard (NP) 11:56.90, 7. Julia Healey (AH) 12:16.45, 8. Chloee Spry (Hon) 12:24.80.8
Pole Vault – 1. Kiana Seid (AH) 11-0, 2. Elinor Schardien (PA) 10-6, 3. Jaden Mucha (NP) 10-6, 4. Hailee Walzer (DV) 10-6, 5. Alexis Reimold (Haz) 10-0, 6. Kennedy Healey (NP) 9-6, 6. Allyson Wolfe (Haz) 9-6, 8. Bella Trollope (NP) 9-6.
Shot Put – 1. Symone Mims (Han) 36-2 ¼, 2. Olivia Wood (Hon) 33-6 ½, 3. Juleisy Tejeda (Haz) 33-5 ¾, 4. Maddison Miller (Hon) 32-4 ½, 5. Sarah Pasternick (Cr) 31-1 ½, 6. Shreve Harley (T) 31-0 ¾, 7. Lexi Bowman (Ber) 30-8, 8. Janette Veliz (Haz) 29-11 ¼.
Triple Jump – 1. Nevaeh Baran (Nan) 39-11, 2. Taylor Gashi (WA) 36-9 ½, 3. Kiana Seid (AH) 35-11 ½, 4. Jaida Underwood (WBA) 35-3, 5. Brynlee Tabor (Dal) 34-11, 6. Camryn Yakupcin (Haz) 34-8 ½, 7. Adrianna Flintosh (Haz) 34-8 ½, 8. Abigail Lovallo (Nant) 34-4
CLASS 2A GIRLS
Team Scores – 1. Montrose (Mon) 62, 2. Western Wayne (WW) 38 ½, 3. Mid Valley (MV) 33 ½, 4. Lakeland (Lake) 33, 5. Holy Redeemer (HR) 28, 6. Lake-Lehman (LL) 23, 7. Dunmore (Dun) 12, 8. Riverside (Riv) 10 ½, 9, Blue Ridge (BR) 9 ½, 10. Lackawanna Trail (LT) 7, 11. Elk Lake (EL) 6, 12. Wyoming Seminary (Sem) 4, 13. Mountain View (MtV) 3, 13. Holy Cross (HC) 3.
3200 Relay – 1. Lake-Lehman (Kinley Purdy, Faith Cadwalader, Cameron Janick, Ava Jones) 9:43.39, 2. Montrose 10:01.92, 3. Elk Lake 10:17.56, 4. Lakeland 10:29.40, 5. Holy Redeemer 10:39.57, 6. Mid Valley 10:43.12, 7. Riverside 10:56.91, 8. Western Wayne 11:11.48.
300 Hurdles – 1. Natalie Talluto (MV) 45.34, 2. Kaylyn Davis (Lake) 45.39*, 3. Keri Michaels (MV) 47.50, 4. Kyra Chepolis (HR) 48.42, 5. Sarah Gorham (BR) 49.51, 6. Molly Weller (Mon) 51.69, 7. Alana Edwards (LT) 51.72, 8. Hailey Bond (LL) 52.53.
3200 Run – 1. Addison Stephens (Mon) 11:55.47, 2. Meghan Griffith (LL) 12:07.09, 3. Kaitlyn Kloss (WW) 12:12.05, 4. Ava Rebello (Mon) 12:16.84, 5. Elena Bialkowski (Riv) 12:19.68, 6. Corinne Flynn (MtV) 12:22.67, 7. Gemma Bistran (HC) 12:30.58, 8. Brynn Negvesky (Riv) 12:59.08.
Discus – 1. Saide Booths (WW) 117-8, 2. Erin Tillotson (Mon) 109-1, 3. Roxie Dugan (WW) 91-5, 4. Anna Tillotson (Mon) 89-4, 5. Kaeleen Dougherty (Scr) 88-3, 6. Layla Sinnett (BR) 86-5, 7. Raeleigh Kromko (WW) 86-4, 8. Alaina Scasselleti (HC) 85-10.
High Jump – 1. Amelia Joseph (Dun) 5-0, 2. Isabella Boylan (HR) 5-0, 3. Naomi Rude (Lake) 4-10, 4. Kristen Eschbach (Mon) 4-10, 5. Payton Dvorshock (BR) 4-6, 5. Kathryn O’Hora (Riv) 4-6, 5. Skyla McGuire (WW) 4-6, 5. Gianna Nichols (MV) 4-6.
Javelin – 1. Sadie Jones (Mon) 125-8, 2. Kaylyn Davis (Lake) 117-1, 3. Isabella Boylan (HR) 109-11, 4. Lila Ryon (LT) 107-7, 5. Delcia Biscotto (LL) 106-9, 6. Raine Kearney (Lake) 101-7, 7. Kate Coviello (MV) 94-6, 8. Sadie Booths (WW) 89-0.
Long Jump – 1. Olivia Thomas (MV) 19-5, 2. Sadie Jones (Mon) 18-2 ¾*, 3. Olivia Haines (WW) 16-7 ¾, 4. Kira Millard (HR) 16-4, 5. Skyla McGuire (WW) 15-11, 6. Rileigh Johnson (Lake) 15-5, 7. Emma DeSando (Dun) 14-10, 8, Nina Barbuti (Riv) 14-8 ¾.
* – qualifies for states on time or distance.
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