ROCHESTER — While Plymouth was winning its 17th girls track and field sectional title Tuesday at Rochester, local teams were advancing as many individuals and relays to regionals as they could. Plymouth took the sectional crown back from the Culver Girls Academy by racking up 154.5 points, while CGA had 93.5 and Culver posted 72, rounding out the top three. Locally, the Manchester Lady Squires won two events and finished fourth as a team (63), with Tippecanoe Valley getting one first-place finish and placing sixth as a team (51) and the Triton Lady Trojans were eighth (43). At the sectional, the top four finishers in each event move on to the regional, with Rochester Sectional qualifiers advancing to Tuesday’s regional at Warsaw Community High School. From Manchester, junior Lindsey Dierks and freshman Rae Bedke took home sectional championships, as Dierks won at high jump and Bedke was the 1600-meter champ. The high jump title is Dierks’ third-straight, and she’s been going up an inch every year, winning the 2014 title by clearing 5-foot-3. “This year, there was better competition, so I had my doubts at first, but once we got to the higher heights, I felt I could come out on top,” Dierks said. “I felt pretty good when I cleared 5-foot by a lot,” she added. “Then, I thought, ‘I got this.’” After clearing 5-3, a personal best, Dierks was left alone to go after the school record height of 5-4.25, but she came up short on her three attempts. Despite not clearing the bar, Dierks said she felt good about her approach. “I felt I had the strength and endurance, but my calf just skimmed the bar on my third jump,” she said. Dierks will now take part in her third-straight regional. As a freshman, Dierks was 10th at the regional and placed sixth a year ago, with the top three moving on to the state meet. This time around, she has her sights set at 5-4 as a height that should get her to state, as the winning leap at last year’s Warsaw Regional was 5-5 and third place was 5-3. “I’m expecting tougher competition, but also building my way to state,” she said. Getting to regional has become old hat to Dierks, but her freshman teammate will be experiencing something new Tuesday. Setting a new school record in the 1600 numerous times this year, Bedke shattered the 5:18.41 time she set at last week’s Three Rivers Conference Championships with a time of 5:12.19 at the sectional. Bedke finished second to Northfield junior Jenna Halderman at the TRC meet, but this time around, she had a different mindset, as Halderman was second in 5:13.72. “I just wanted to stay with her the whole time and in the last lap, just go all out as hard as I could,” Bedke said. The duo did go all out, as Bedke took a lead after the first 100 meters of the fourth lap, but Halderman appeared to regain control by getting the lead with 200 meters to go. Instead of proving she had made her move too early, Bedke found another gear and ran away with the sectional title in the final 100 meters. “I was just thinking, ‘I can do it I have more. I’ve been training all year for it, so I might as well go’” Bedke said of her thought process coming down the final 200 meters of the race. On top of winning the 1600, Bedke also advanced to the regional with a second-place finish in the 800 (2:23.68) and was a part of the fourth-place 4x400 relay (4:28.55) with sophomore Ali Casper, junior Heidi France and freshman Tahnee Fuentes. “This is more than I could have expected,” Bedke said. “I didn’t think I’d go this far, but I’m just happy with my team, my coach and it’s just been a really good year.” Also from Manchester, its 4x100 relay (53.99) of Casper, France, Fuentes and Alyssa Peyton advanced with a second-place finish and senior Alex Shelton was fourth in the 100 (13.36). From Valley, sophomore Lexi O’Connell bounced back from a sub-par performance at the TRC Meet. At the conference meet, O’Connell finished fourth in the 100 hurdles with a time of 18.08, but was re-focused for the sectional winning in 16.39. “I expected her to do this,” Valley coach Alysha Wachtmann said of O’Connell. “The TRC (meet) was a rough day for her, so I told her all week that she could be the sectional champ and she ended up doing it.” O’Connell also finished fourth in the 300 hurdles (51.35) and ran a leg of the team’s third-place 4x400 relay (4:26.94) with junior Jazzmine Brown and sophomore sisters Brooklyn Conley and Breelyn Conley. After not competing in Valley’s hurdles at last year’s sectional, O’Connell has continually worked on the event, and it’s paying off. “We’ve really been working on running in-between the hurdles,” Wachtmann said of O’Connell’s biggest improvement. “This was the first meet that she actually did the three-stepping the whole way. When you three-step the entire way, you’re tough to beat. “At the beginning of the year, we set our goals and expectations, and she’s met all of them,” she added. Brown also had quite the day for the Lady Vikings, advancing to regionals in three other events besides the 4x400 relay, placing third in both the 400 (1:02.82) and high jump (5-0) and helping the 4x100 relay of freshman Hannah Brower, Breelyn Conley and sophomore Madi Miller place fourth (54.06). Valley senior Hailee Hunsberger also made the regional cut, placing fourth in the shot put (33-7.25) and discus (103-0). Triton junior Jaela Meister will also be busy at the sectional, as she finished second in the 300 hurdles (50.38) and pole vault (8-6), as well as third in the 100 hurdles (17.05) at the sectional. Triton junior Autumn Kann also qualified for the regional by tying for fourth place in the high jump (4-10).
