Seasons end at IPFW

FORT WAYNE — Jay County coach Brian McEvoy hopes Saturday’s experience will help motivate his team for next season.
The Patriot girls finished 18th out of 20 teams, scoring 443 points at the semi-state high school cross country meet hosted by New Haven at IPFW.
McEvoy is already looking forward to next season as his team will return all the top seven runners on its roster, which included three freshmen this year.
“We’re really excited,” McEvoy said. “We’ll come into next season knowing we can be pretty darn good. … I think our expectations will be way higher next year.
“I’m really proud of them. It’s a young group.”
The meet also marked the end of the season for Jay County’s Dylan Cope and the South Adams boys team.
Cope, just the second JCHS boys to advance to the semi-state in the last decade, placed 69th in the boys competition.
Brody Shane was 27th individually to lead the Starfires to a 12th-place finish with 291 points.
The top six teams and top 15 individuals advance to state competition.
“I was disappointed for the boys, because I knew how much they really wanted to go on. … It’s kind of a bitter pill to swallow at the end of a good season … but I thought these guys accomplished at a pretty high level in spite of everything they had going against them,” said SAHS coach Clint Anderson, whose team won its first sectional title despite being without 2011 state qualifier Evan Liechty because of an illness. “To me it’s really had to see the season end because it means that we’re saying farewell to six seniors who have been the backbone of this program … To say I’m proud is kind of an understatement …”
The Patriot girls finished ahead of Yorktown (474) and Delta (540), two of their rivals from the Delta regional. They were 40 points behind 17th-place Eastbrook.
Top-ranked Carroll (62) won the semi-state title ahead of No. 12 Northridge (117), Concordia (170), Homestead (189) and Huntington North (190).
No. 1 Carroll also won the boys competition, scoring 40 points to finish in front of Homestead (110), Bishop Dwenger (129), No. 12 Northridge (164), Goshen (175) and Mishawaka (186).
Shane’s effort was the best individually among local runners, but he was still about 25 seconds short of earning a berth in the state finals. The junior led the Starfires with a time of 16 minutes, 41.53 seconds.
Sawyer Miller, a sophomore, followed Shane as he posted a time of 16:59 for 40th place.
“Brody and Sawyer both ran what I thought were pretty solid races,” said Anderson. “They both executed really well. It’s just the quality of the field was just a little too much for them.”
Abigail Johnson paced the Jay County girls team, showing vast improvement from last season. She finished 63rd in 20:45 after placing 120th a year ago.
Freshman Megan Wellman trailed just behind Johnson for much of the race and placed 77th in 21 minutes flat.
“That’s a big stride from what Abigail did last year,” said McEvoy of the junior, who won the Delta sectional title. “We’re just continuing see the steps …
“(Johnson and Wellman) both … backed up what they did at sectional and regional. That’s huge. It’s a tough thing to do in this environment.”
Cope was about 15th as he ran in the lead group after the opening straightway, but was unable to keep up that pace. He closed his career with a 69th-place finish in 17:27.
“He’s progressively gotten better each year,” said McEvoy of Cope, who was the sectional and regional runner-up. “It just says a lot about him because he’s put in a lot of work. …
“I thought he did a real good job competing. Getting here is a huge accomplishment.”
South Adams’ Joel Hawbaker was 75th in 17:30 followed by Andrew Steffen (103rd – 17:52) and Simon Sprunger (105th – 17:52).
Freshman Kellie Fortkamp turned in the No. 3 time for the Jay County girls as she finished 121st in 21:55. Kaitlin Hemmelgarn was 127th in 22:08, and Emi Minnich placed 140th in 22:58.
“We’ve got a young group,” said McEvoy, whose top five all season was made up of two juniors and three freshmen. “It’s a building experience. … (Semi-state) needs to be a priority with how we train and what we do in the summer, to come here and compete better than we have overall.”
Also running Saturday were Abbi Dunlavy (141st – 23:09) and Patricia Hein (147th – 23:21) for the JCHS girls and Cody Sprunger (123rd – 17:07) and Daniel Velasco (140th – 18:37) for the South Adams boys.


[[In-content Ad]]