Stars edge Jay

BLUFFTON — It came down to the final race.
The Starfire girls track team had led the Patriots for the majority of the meet Friday night, and when the two teams lined up to begin the 4x400-meter relay, they knew what they were about to undergo.
The winner would likely be the Allen County Athletic Conference champion.
Jay County and South Adams went toe-to-toe for 1,400 meters, but Starfire sophomore Caroline Kloepper pulled away in the final 200 meters to give her team a three-second victory in the race and an overall win in the meet.
South Adams scored 133 points, edging Jay County by two points to win the ACAC championship. Leo finished third with 101.5 points.
Leo claimed the boys title with 142 points. Bluffton was runner up with 115 points and Woodlan finished third with 86.5 points. South Adams (81.5) was fifth, and Jay County (32) placed seventh.
“This is great because a couple weeks ago, we knew we still had things to do to make up a gap,” said SAHS coach Clint Anderson, whose team won six events on the night. “We started making some changes. The girls accepted them and had a good attitude about it, and to come in here today … we knew there were some places we had to make up some points and they did it.”
Freshmen Addie Wanner and Olivia Von Gunten each won two individual races, and helped Kloepper in the winning 4x400 relay as well. Wanner posted a new ACAC record time in the 100 hurdles (15.67 seconds) and took first in the high jump, tying the school record for the third time with a height of 5 feet, 2 inches. She was also second in the 300 hurdles.
Von Gunten crossed the finish line in 2 minutes, 23.2 seconds, to win the 800 run, and picked up the victory in the 1,600 with a time of 5:27.52 seconds. Both races she won easily, beating Megan Wellman of Jay County by eight seconds in the latter, and outlasting Jay County’s Ava Kunkler in the 800 by more than five seconds.
“That’s phenomenal,” Anderson said of his freshman duo. “They weren’t intimidated at all. They came in, they attacked everything like they always have and they performed.”
Kloepper, who had run the 400 just twice all season, claimed her only individual title Friday night in 1 minute, 0.59 seconds. But it was her performance in the 4x400 with which she was most pleased.
“It was really close,” she said of the final race in which the Starfires and Patriots were side-by-side most of the way. “We kept up with them the whole thing.”
Just like her teammates before her, Kloepper stayed in stride with Jay County’s runner, but she came out ahead down the stretch.
“It was tough,” JCHS coach Brian McEvoy, whose team won two races, said of the runner-up finish in the 4x400. “They knew what the situation was. I put those four girls in that race because I thought they were four of the toughest girls I had.”
Erika Kunkler started the race next to Wanner. Britlyn Dues ran the second leg for Jay County, and Lexi Myers ran the third. Wanner passed the baton to Hannah Imel, who gave it to Von Gunten for the third leg.
“I wanted them in that position,” McEvoy said “They battled really hard. It came down to Ava, and Ava gave us a really great effort.”
Ava Kunkler ran the lead leg of Jay County’s championship 4x800 relay team. She joined her sister Erika, Briana Muhlenkamp and Wellman to finish with a time of 10:22.82 seconds. It gave Jay County a conference title in the first event of its first ACAC meet.
Senior McKensie Muhlenkamp earned the other title, throwing the discus 91 feet, 2 1/2 inches.
Bailey McIntire and Drew LeFever each won an event for the South Adams boys. McIntire placed first in the 3,200 (10:03.22), and LeFever threw the shot 51 feet, 10 inches for his victory.
Aaron Neal of Jay County earned the best individual finish for the Patriots. He was second in the 110 hurdles with a time of 15.53 seconds.