A meet between two 6-0 Northern Lakes Conference teams turned into a laugher Thursday at the Tigers Athletic Complex.
The Warsaw Lady Tigers track and field team improved to 10-1 on the year and closed its NLC regular season at 7-0 with a 96-36 win over the Northridge Lady Raiders (6-1 NLC)."It was a meet that a team could win first through third or you could get beat 1-3, and that could shift the points around quite a bit," Warsaw coach Scott Erba said.
On this night, getting swept in an event didn't happen to the Lady Tigers.
Winning 13 of the 16 events, Warsaw took first and second place in three events, as well as first, second and third in another three.
As the results began to come in, Warsaw's Kelly Wildman, Ryesha Jackson and Audrey Petro went 1, 2 and 3 in the long jump, respectively, while Hannah Kammerer and Kristen VanOsdol finished first and second, respectively, in the pole vault.
"Going 1-2-3 in the long jump and 1-2 in the pole vault, that kind of got the ball rolling," Erba said. "Our 4x800 relay was a little modified, and we had our best running time of the year. That was a great way to start the meet and got the girls pumped up for each one of their races."
That 3,200 relay team of Hannah Cutshall, Brooke Kline, Lilly Fleming and Cendall Ogle dominated the usually strong long-distance Northridge team, finishing in 9:41.48 to the Raiders' 9:55.02.
After that, Warsaw just continued to roll, as only Northridge's Lauren Lambert (100) and Skylair Hilton (3200) managed to get contested wins.
The Raiders other first-place finish came in the last event of the night, the 1,600 relay, in which Erba didn't field a squad with his team in front 96-31.
"Some girls came up to me, and they were hurting a little bit," Erba said about not running the relay. "Rather than running an event that wouldn't be meaningful for the outcome of the meet, I could save them and have them ready for Tuesday's conference meet."
Having already won the regular season portion of the NLC, Warsaw will look to wrap up its fifth-straight conference title at the NLC Championships Tuesday at WCHS at 5 p.m.
"I feel very, very good going into that meet," Erba said. "Tonight was a night to finalize lineups for conference and sectional. We had some girls really improve."
Other notable performances at Thursday's meet were Corinne Coon's personal best time of :46.30 in the 300 hurdles, eclipsing her time at the state finals last year, and Warsaw taking first through sixth in the discus and first through third (Emily Umbaugh, Sarah Heagy, Gabby Monroy) in the shot put.
