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BY VAL TSOUTSOURIS
Sports Editor, RTC
Culver’s Kennedy Jackson advanced to the IHSAA state finals in the shot put for the second straight year and broke the school record en route to making state at the Goshen regional Tuesday.
Jackson was third in the shot put with a throw of 40-2. The top three in each event and those who met a difficult state qualifying standard advanced to state.
Jackson finished 20th at the 2022 state finals in the shot put when she competed for Rochester. The previous Culver school record was 39-11 ½ set by Mickella Hardy Stevens, who is now one of Jackson’s coaches.
Whitko’s Gwen Howard won the regional title with a throw of 45-1. Concord’s Macie Swinehart took second at 43-5 ½.
Jackson also placed fifth in the discus with a throw of 113-1.
Culver Academy won the regional with 61 points, four more than runner-up Penn.
Among area teams, Culver finished 21st with 10 points, Pioneer was 22nd with 9, Valley was 30th with 3, and Rochester was 33rd with 1.
Rochester
Senior Zoe Seward accounted for Rochester’s lone point by placing eighth in the 3,200 meters in 11:55.13. This time was 22 seconds faster than her sectional time at Bremen on May 16 and 39 seconds faster than her Three Rivers Conference time meet.
This closed out Seward’s prep running career. She will run for the University of Southern Indiana in the fall.
Meanwhile, Macie Nelson finished in a tie for 10th in the pole vault with a clearance of 9-0. This broke Nelson’s personal best. Nelson vaulted 8-6 at the Bremen sectional.
Tippecanoe Valley
Valley’s three points came courtesy of freshman Betty Shepherd, who took sixth in the 300 hurdles in 48.19 seconds. This was a 1.49-second improvement on her time at the Bremen sectional, where she finished second, and a 1.83-second improvement on her TRC time.
Shepherd won the TRC title with her time of 50.02 at Wabash on May 5.
Cousin Annabel Parker of Warsaw was eighth at the regional in 48.88.
In the 400 meters, junior Chesnee Miller placed 12th in 1:02.81. Miller was fourth at the Bremen sectional in 1:01.22 but received a callback. She was also second at the TRC meet in the 400.
Culver
Jackson accounted for all 10 Culver points. Hardy Stevens was the most recent Culver shot putter to reach the state finals when she was second at the 2014 regional.
Hardy Stevens, Kayla Shaffer (100, 200) and Denisha Brown (100, long jump) all made the state finals in 2014. No Culver girl has made state since.
Pioneer
The most well represented area school was Pioneer, who had seven different regional entries.
The highest finisher was Paula Collado Fernandez. The Madrid, Spain native and future Grace College athlete took fifth in the 400 meters in a season best 59.87 seconds.
Collado Fernandez also ran a leg on the 4 x 400 relay team that ran a 4:10.95 and finished seventh. The 4:10.95 was a new school record and was 3.98 seconds faster than their time in winning the Kokomo sectional on May 16. Blair Grigsby, Chloe Chan and Rachel Harding also ran legs on the relay.
Keirsten Nies, a sophomore, also scored by high-jumping 5-1 and finishing seventh. She fell one inch short of a top-three finish and a state berth.
Freshman Aspen Moolenaar also scored a point by placing eighth in the pole vault with a clearance of 9-6. The vault was six inches higher than her sectional vault, which was good enough for second place.
Moolenaar also took 15th place in the 100 hurdles in 17.48 seconds, and she joined Nies, Michelle Harding and Rachel Harding in finishing 10th in the 4 x 100 relay in 51.55 seconds.
As for Michelle Harding, the Kokomo sectional long jump champ took 14th place at the regional with a jump of 14-9. Harding did not advance out of the preliminary round. She jumped 16-8 at the sectional.
Goshen girls track regional results: 1. Culver Academy 61, 2. Penn 57, 3. Warsaw 56, 4. South Bend Adams 45, 5. Concord 38, 21. Culver 10, 22. Pioneer 9, 30. Tippecanoe Valley 3, 33. Rochester 1
Scoring on 10-8-6-5-4-3-2-1 basis for all events
State qualifiers (top three) plus all Rochester, Valley, Culver and Pioneer athletes
100 m
1. Thomas (South Bend Adams) – 12.01 seconds, 2. Williams (Elkhart) – 12.40, 3. Burner (Warsaw) – 12.45
200 m
1. Thomas (South Bend Adams) – 25.69 seconds, 2. DeFreese (Concord) – 26.03, 3. Guiliani (Manchester) – 26.07
400 m
1. Bird (Culver Academy) – 57.96 seconds, 2. Griffin (Lewis Cass) – 58.05, 3. Leonard (South Bend Washington) – 58.13, 5. Paula Collado Fernandez (PIO) – 59.87, 12. Chesnee Miller (TV) – 1:02.81
800 m
1. Economou (Penn) – 2:15.42, 2. Rastrelli (Warsaw) – 2:18.96, 3. Mullinax (Columbia City) – 2:19.25
1,600 m
1. Eubank (Penn) – 5:01.40, 2. Rastrelli (Warsaw) – 5:04.21, 3. Moore (Northwestern) – 5:05.93
3,200 m
1. Eubank (Penn) – 11:00.12, 2. Moore (Northwestern) – 11:06.39, 3. Stabnik (Penn) – 11:07.40, 8. Zoe Seward (RHS) – 11:55.13
100 m hurdles
1. Swanson (South Bend Washington) – 14.52 seconds, 2. Douglas (South Bend Washington) – 15.43, 3. Scott (Lewis Cass) – 15.64, 15. Aspen Moolenaar (PIO) – 17.48
300 m hurdles
1. Swanson (South Bend Washington) – 46.02 seconds, 2. Frick (South Bend St. Joe) – 46.29, 3. Scott (Lewis Cass) – 46.65, 6. Betty Shepherd (TV) – 48.19
4 x 100 m relay
1. NorthWood – 49.38 seconds, 2. South Bend Adams – 50.05, 3. Kokomo – 50.48, 10. Pioneer (Keirsten Nies, Michelle Harding, Aspen Moolenaar, Rachel Harding) – 51.55
4 x 400 m relay
1. Warsaw – 4:03.60, 2. Culver Academy – 4:03.81, 3. NorthWood – 4:04.64, 7. Pioneer (Blair Grigsby, Chloe Chan, Paula Collado Fernandez, Rachel Harding) – 4:10.95 (school record)
4 x 800 m relay
1. Northridge – 9:31.59, 2. Penn – 9:36.86, 3. Columbia City – 9:42.38
Long jump
1. Spiller (Culver Academy) – 17-11 ½, 2. Brooks (Eastern (Greentown)) – 17-5, 3. Harper (Whitko) – 17-4 ¾, 14. Michelle Harding (PIO) – 14-9
High jump
1. Spiller (Culver Academy) – 5-3, 2. Jackson (Northwestern) – 5-2, 3. Douglas (South Bend Adams) – 5-2, 7. Keirsten Nies (PIO) – 5-1
Discus
1. Yoder (Wawasee) – 156-1, 2. Decker (Elkhart) – 125-1, 3. Howard (Whitko) – 121-7, 5. Kennedy Jackson (CUL) – 113-1
Shot put
1. Howard (Whitko) – 45-1, 2. Swinehart (Concord) – 43-5 ½, 3. Kennedy Jackson (CUL) – 40-2
Pole vault
1. Robinson (Concord) – 11-0, 2. DeVries (Mishawaka) – 11-0, 3. Transparenti (Warsaw) – 10-9, 8. Aspen Moolenaar (PIO) – 9-6, t-10. Macie Nelson (RHS) – 9-0
