Stigleman fights injury, makes regional

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MUNCIE — Calli Stigleman has been battling lower leg issues for most of the season.

The kinesiology tape on her shins and her facial expression while she runs are dead giveaways as to the pain she endures with every stride.

Tuesday was another meet she had to fight through the discomfort.

She’s got another week of practice — and at least one more meet — to overcome the soreness.

Stigleman, a Jay County High School senior, earned two individual regional qualifications and helped a relay advance from the IHSAA Girls Track and Field Sectional meet at Delta on Tuesday.

“I just keep trying to push through it and do what I can,” said Stigleman, who was third in both the 100- and 200-meter dash events, and was part of the 4x100 relay that was second.

The top three places in each event qualify for regional, which will be May 22 at Ben Davis in Indianapolis.

“I felt like she’s really grown a lot since last year,” said JCHS coach Brian McEvoy, whose team totaled 109 points for third place. Yorktown repeated as team champions with 159 points, and host Delta totaled 114 points for second.

“I thought it was a really good team effort,” McEvoy said. “I thought our margin of error was razor thin. Yorktown is a very, very solid team so for us to win this as a team it just had to go absolutely perfect. We just weren’t able to make that happen, obviously.”

McEvoy was still pleased with how Stigleman was able to pull through despite the pain in her legs.

“I think if we can ever get her healthy and get that all put together she’s going to be a really hard force to deal with,” he said. “She’s faced a lot of adversity than other years. She has not been 100 percent, but she’s fought really hard and had good results on top of it.”

After qualifying for the 100 dash final — the top two in each heat plus the next two fastest times make the final — in 13.30 seconds to be seeded second, she shaved 0.14 seconds off her prelim time. But third-seeded Carley Culberson of Yorktown took off eight hundredths of a second with her championship time of 12.73 seconds.

Jay County senior Lucy Laux, who was defending sectional champion, was fourth in 13.46 as she missed regional.

In the 200 dash, Stigleman had a prelim time of 27.87 as she was seeded third behind Yorktown’s Kelsey Morgan (27.35) and JCHS freshman Kinsey Shannon (27.43).

Culberson moved up from her No. 6 seed to win in 26.57 seconds, Morgan crossed in 27.39 seconds and Stigleman placed third in 27.94 seconds.

“Really proud of what she’s been able to do and the growth that she’s had, maturity and the work ethic this year,” McEvoy said.

Shannon did not run in the 200 dash final.

Stigleman ran the second leg of the 4x100 relay that was runner-up to Delta by less than half a second. She joined Karlie Bullard, Renee Omstead and Laux to finish in 52.94 seconds.

“We’re going to have to get our handoffs smoothed out in some areas,” McEvoy said. “We don’t have any room for error at that point. We have to keep the baton moving.”

The Patriots were runners-up in the meet-ending 4x400 relay and the first race of the night, the 4x800 relay. Grace Saxman, Kendra Muhlenkamp, Ashlyn Dow and Omstead had a time of 4 minutes, 20.76 seconds in the former, while Sophia Fugiett, Kendal Garringer, Gabby Kunkler and Muhlenkamp had a time of 10:46.12 in the latter.

Yorktown won both races.

Shannon, a freshman who earned Jay County’s only Allen County Athletic Conference championship in the 400 dash a week ago, earned her first regional berth in the same event as she was runner-up with her time of 59.93 seconds. She ran hip-to-hip with Morgan but the Yorktown Tiger edged her by 0.33 seconds.

“She just started running the 400 (dash) a few weeks ago,” McEvoy said. “We just tried her at it on the fly. We thought she’d be good at it. Each time she’s ran she’s gotten faster and faster.

“Hopefully that’s something that we can achieve next week at the regional. She’s a pretty special athlete. She has all the parts and pieces to make it happen and as she gets more experience she’s going to be tough across the board.”

Also earning regional berths were Taylor Muhlenkamp and Laux, who finished second in the long jump and discus respectively. Muhlenkamp had a distance of 102 feet, while Laux jumped 15 feet, 7.5 inches.

Finishing in the top eight and scoring points for Jay County were Breea Liette (fourth – 100 hurdles, fourth – 300 hurdles), Kendra Muhlenkamp (fourth – 800 run), Gwen Omstead (fourth – discus, seventh – shot put), Gabby Kunkler (eighth – 3,200 run), Saxman (fifth – 100 hurdles, fifth – 300 hurdles), Fugiett (sixth – 1,600 run), Dow (fifth – 400 dash), Garringer (fifth – high jump) and Shannon (fifth – long jump).