Results! – courtesy of Speed Sport Timing
Replay below!
By Ryan Moyer
Just coming away from the Division I State meet, Division II had just as much to offer with the number of records and unexpected finishes within all of the events. This is the second year the state championships are being held at Plymouth State University, and we can’t be thankful enough to see such performances run in a spectacular facility we have the privilege to have these kids race in. Another shout out once again to Chris Benson and Brian Johnson of Speed Sport Timing for timing the meet, alongside our officials to keep all events running smoothly with both DI and DII on the same day. It’s also worth mentioning that thanks to our executive producer Greg Hall as he organized special coverage for each field event, they took center stage for the first hour and a half of the event. Now for a look into all the performances that went down for the Division II State Championships.
Girls Recap
Field Events
There were two upset performances as Hanna Tomany of Sanborn had a huge day when she cleared 5’ for a new personal best to take the state championship from the second seed and Callie Dixon of Newport as the third seed winning the shot put with a mark of 34’ 2”. Eshaya Lauder from Manchester West not only claimed victory in the long jump, but she also set the Division II record with a leap of 18’ 2” breaking the record by about two inches set back in 2007 by Anna Cioffredi from Lebanon.
Sprints/Hurdles
HB’s Grace Dow entered as the top seed for the finals in the 55-meter hurdles and stayed atop when she finished in 8.61 seconds. Ava Lacasse of Belmont looked quick in the back half of the season, and she pulled off the win in the 55-meter dash ahead of Maddox Lovely of Newport and Macy Sawyer of Gilford. Kylie Rapoza from Kingswood also finished ahead of the two previously mentioned in second place. Sawyer returned in the 300-meters to take the crown in the event in 41.25 seconds ahead of Rapoza who finished in 41.74 seconds.
Middle Distance/Distance
In the 600-meters, Hannah Pawlowski of Bow has looked dominant in the race posting two new personal bests and DII top times in back-to-back weeks. She broke her previous best by three seconds to win in 1:38.52. The Oyster River duo of Haley Kavanagh and Mackenzie Cook put on a distance clinic as the two swept the next three events. Cook won the 1K and 3K with her 3K time being a new DII record in 9:57.73 by roughly a second from 2018 by Julia Robitaille of West. She followed up with the 1K time of 3:05.69. Kavanagh ran the 1500-meters to also set not only a record for DII, but a new state record with a time of 4:33.31 to break each record by four and three seconds, respectively.
Relays
Kavanagh started her day in the 4×800-meter relay as she along with Madelyn Cook, Jahrie Houle and Sadie Goldberg won in 10:09.46. Oyster River also took the 4×400 relay as Kavanagh and Mackenzie Cook, both record holders by this point, took first for the third time united with Nora Rogers and Avery Baumgardt in 4:21.48. There was quite a showdown in the 4×200-meter relay between, Belmont, Kennett, and Kingswood’s’ teams as they all finished within tenths of a second from each other, but Belmont’s Hannah Young, Talia Watson, Adeline Takantjas, and Lacasse won in 1:53.46.
Team Scores
There’s no shock that Oyster River came out on top with 80 points in first place, but the race was certainly for the runner-up which went to Hollis/Brookline who was ahead by a point of Belmont with 30 to 29 points.
Boys Recap
Field Events
Just like in Division I, the long jump field was stacked with five boys over 20 feet. Rere Edokpolo from Trinity defended his title in the event after he jumped 21’ 10” coming off a DII record performance last year. Rio Calle of John Stark was in a showdown with Owen Turner of Merrimack Valley, but Calle cleared 6’ 2” before Turner so off the tiebreak going up to 6’ 6”, Calle won clearing a height of 6’ 4”. Barnaby Diehn tossed 52’ 8.25” in the shot put to take down reigning champion Joel Douzanis from John Stark who came second.
Sprints/Hurdles
DII records were set in the sprints starting with Colby Crear in the 55-meter hurdles when he ran 7.48 seconds to break the previous record by a hundredth of a second. Avery Wilson from Milford followed suit in the 55-meter dash with a winning time of 6.49 seconds. Ross Stephens of Con-Val edged out Kody McCranie from Bow in the 300-meters in a time of 35.68 seconds.
Middle Distance/Distance
Merrimack Valley’s Mychal Reynolds found his state title in the 600-meters when he paced the field and crossed in 1:25.50 to beat Jacob Hoesch of HB’s 1:25.91. Peyton Joslyn from Monadnock broke 2:40 in the 1K to win in 2:39.97. Hanover’s Andrew Valentino and Will Simard of Con-Val were in a fight for the 3K state title. Valentino helmed the race for 12 laps, but Simard took off with three to go and never looked back to win in 8:42.23 while Valentino finished respectively 8:46.16. They doubled in the 1500-meters, but Daniel Dalbec of Kearsarge pulled out the win with a time of 4:10.94.
Relays
Milford found quite a bit of its points from the relays with the 4×800-meter team of Chase Paiva, Grant Skorupan, Will Whitley, and Logan Korthals in 8:27.98 and the 4×400-meter squad of Whitley, Wilson, Korthals, and Kenyon Sora with a combined time of 3:34.37 from, impressively, the second to last heat. In the 4×200-meter relay, Trinity topped the field in 1:35.24 with Edokpolo, Ewa Edokpolo, Davey Durepo, and Anthony DiGiantommaso.
Team Scores
It was going to be an interesting result to look out for as there were so many teams in the running to win, but Milford came out on in the lead with 51 points with Con-Val putting themselves in second with 35 points and John Stark third with 30 points.
Congratulations again to all our winners and All-State honorees!
