OAK PARK EDGES FARMINGTON, WINS OAA BLUE/GOLD TITLE
WEST BLOOMFIELD » There are some leads that you merely build upon, and some that you have to quickly rebuild.
After leading by a boatload earlier in Thursday’s OAA Blue/ Gold Championships, the Oak Park girls track and field team had to get a win in the final event to jump back in front of a Farmington squad that had erased that lead, and taken a one-point advantage entering the day’s last relay.
While the Knights eked out a three-point win over the Falcons — 138.5 to 135.5 — with a firstplace finish in the 4-by-400 relay to win their ninth straight Blue/ Gold title, the Farmington boys jumped ahead of second-place West Bloomfield mid-meet, and just kept piling on the points, winning by 41, 164 to 123.
“Farmington has a quality program, and they’re so widespread in the events that they can do, you know, some of the areas that we aren’t as strong, they’re very strong in, and vice versa,” Oak Park coach Brandon Jiles said. “But I was happy with the kids’ overall performance. You know, we tried some things out today, we worked on some things, we worked on some fitness because the day went by really fast. But I’m pleased. The coaches did a good job, the kids were focused today, and this is our first meet of championship season — we’re just using it as a stepping stone to the next meet.”
Through nine events, the Knights led Farmington 88.5 to 59.5, then piled on 24 more points by sweeping the top three spots in the 300-meter hurdles — with Nonah Waldron (43.35), Morgan Roundtree (43.69) and Emon Miles (46.13) finishing 1-2-3.
In the intervening five events, though, Oak Park picked up just 16 more points, while Farmington scored 70 to take a 129.5 to 128.5 lead headed into the 4-by400. Oak Park’s relay squad ripped off a 4:04.66 to win by nearly 15 seconds over Royal Oak and 16 over Farmington, putting the meet in the win column.
The Farmington and West Bloomfield boys were running nearly neck-and-neck early in the meet, but the Falcons started to get some separation in the 4-by-100 relay, when they finished first (43.91) and the Lakers were disqualified.
“It helped get some momentum. But you know, there’s not a lot of distance events early on. And we think we put up 60 points in between the 1,600, the 800 and the 3,200. I mean, their sprints are really good, and so are ours,” Farmington co-coach Jeremy Auer said. “All those events, it was pretty even, then we just piled on the distance points.”
Peter Baracco’s dominance there put the Falcons over the top. The senior won the 800 run (2:01.96), the 1,600 (4:30.66) and the 3,200 (10:11.63), while teammates Eddie King, Kevin MIller and Gavin Steele added top-five finishes.
“He (Baracco) was sick last week, and weren’t sure if he was gonna run last weekend. And this week, he will he asked to do all three,” Auer said. “He was excited to do it. Winning all three helped and, you know, Gavin, Kevin and Eddie scored plenty of points for us there, too.”
Jayden Vann finished second in the long jump (20-feet7.75) behind North Farmington’s Prentice Gardner (20-10), while Jake Steslicki set a school record to win the discus (172-1) by more than 36 feet, and finished second (45-6.5) in the shot put, behind West Bloomfield’s Mike Williams (48-1.5).
Will Coltrane (11.52) and Keichan Wilson (11.58) were 2-3 behind West Bloomfield’s Deonte Pippen Jr. in the 100 dash (11.4), while Jaylen Gilmore won the 300 hurdles (40.85), and was third (16.65) in the 110 hurdles.
“It’s fun when the throws, the distance, the jumps, the sprinters — like everybody has to be solid, so that where you have the advantage can be the advantage. If everybody else doesn’t do their part, then it just doesn’t make up for it,” Farmington co-head
coach Kim Adams said. “We get back tomorrow and we’ll practice and one of our coaches, he brings this bucket — the PR Jug and he put it on like this trophy he basically found someplace, painted it gold. Inside of it is Starburst. And so he gives out Starburst to stars of the meet. Anybody who gets a PR or wins a medal. I mean, we’re gonna we’re gonna be eating some candy tomorrow.”
West Bloomfield won the 4-by-200 (1:29.68) and 4-by-800 (8:24.13) relays.
Royal Oak finished third in the boys standings (69 points), followed by Oak Park (65) and Birmingham Groves (47.5) to round out the top five.
Josh Rioux went 5-10 to win the high jump for North Farmington.
Josh Flake won the 200 (22.60) and 400 (48.76) dashes for Oak Park, while the Knights’ relay team won the 4-by-400 relay (3:27.54)
Royal Oak’s Blake Vier won the 110 hurdles (15.30).
It was much closer on the girls side, despite the early points scored by Oak Park.
Knights sophomore Kylee King won the 800 (2:16.40) and 1,600 (5:15.71) ahead of Farmington freshman Molly Baracco, while Oak Park’s relay squads won the 4-by-100 (47.89), 4-by-200 (1:40.78) and 4-by-400, and Miles won the high jump (5foot-0).
Waldron (14.26), Drelin Mapp (14.45) and Roundtree (14.77) went 1-2-3 in the 100 hurdles.
“Right now, you know, that’s our strong suit. And the crazy thing is, we had two other kids who are probably all-staters in the hurdles, who didn’t get a chance to run because you could only run three people,” Jiles said of his hurdlers. “But we’re just chipping away and we’re just trying to get better. That event is very important to our success. If we don’t do well in it, then we probably don’t do well, moving forward.”
Bianca Evuleocha won the 400 dash for Farmington (59.57), while Faylinn Wong won the 3,200 (12:05.93), while the Falcons’ relay team won the 4-by-800 (10:21.92).
Royal Oak’s Elyse Finch (118-9) edged Farmington’s Seyna Coly (114-2) in the discus, but Coly came back to win the shot put (35-11.5).
“We talked about ahead of time. They asked where we, you know, might finish and, you know, we can’t control that they (the Knights) are gonna sweep the hurdles, but we can control we do on the track,” Auer said. “And, again, we score tons of points where they don’t, you know, so we thought for sure, we could be second. Wen it came down to it, we thought we had a chance to win and it got pretty exciting.”
Royal Oak was third with 78 points, followed by West Bloomfield (69.5) and Birmingham Groves (57.5) to round out the top five on the girls side.
Berkley’s DaKya Cunningham won the 100 (12.82) and 200 (26.11) dashes.