Like St. Vincent’s girls’ basketball and volleyball teams this school year, another historic postseason finish could be in the making for another Indians girls’ sports program.
For the second time in three years on Saturday, the St. Vincent girls track and field team brought home a district championship – its second in three years — as it advanced to the sectional meet in a total of 10 events.
The Lady Indians won this year’s Class 1 District 1 title by scoring an overall total of 122.5 after winning six events. They were the only team in the district to top 100 points.
St. Vincent junior Reagan Meyer recorded a team-high 38 points and took home gold medals in both the 800 and 1,600-meter runs for the second consecutive season.
Meyer crossed the finish line at the two minute, 20.08 second-mark in the 800, which is her season-best time, and she recorded a new personal best and school-record time of 5:15.16 in the 1600. Meyer, who won the Class 2 state championships in both events as a sophomore, unsurprisingly has the 800 and 1600 times in all of Class 1. Additionally, Meyer was a member of the Indians district title 3,200-meter relay team that won the race at 4:28.76. Recording a firstplace finish with Reagan was junior Jenna Unterreiner, sophomore Paige Leible and freshman Brynn Renner.
Leible, Renner and Unterreiner also led St. Vincent’s 800-meter relay team to win gold as well with a time of 1:55.6. These three accomplished this first-place finish along with junior Payton Unterreiner.
The Indians two other district championships came on the field as junior Sophia Taylor won the triple jump with a mark of 33 feet, 3 inches. Also qualifying for sectionals in the same event with a third-place finish was senior Brigid Sauer at 31-3.
The sixth and final district title was won by St. Vincent senior Reese Zoellner in pole vault, where she had a vault of 6-11.75.
The fourth event Meyer scored points in was with the 3,200 team, which crossed the finish line at 10:53.89 to take second place and reach sectionals. Reagan was joined on the team by senior Abigail Kirn, junior Audrey Amschler and freshman Anna Welker.
Renner and Welker also took second place individually in their respective events as Brynn was the runner-up in the 400-meter dash (1:03.87), while Anna did so in the 3,200-meter run (13:31.4).
The three other individual, sectional qualifiers for the Indians were Amschler in the 800 (third place at 2:44.84), Kirn in the 3,200 (fourth at 14:07.46) and Jenna Unterreiner in the javelin throw (fourth at 92-9).
As a team, the St. Vincent girls have never placed in the top four at state to earn a plaque. The Indians placed ninth in last year’s Class 2 State Meet as Meyer was the lone athlete for St. Vincent to qualify.
Hopefully now that the Indians are in Class 1, they can make even more noise this time around.
On the boys’ side, St. Vincent finished as the Class 1 District 1 runner-up with a final score of 105, behind Dora, which won the team district title with a score of 116.
However, the Indians won two events and will actually compete in the same number of events as the girls’ team at sectionals (10).
St. Vincent’s boys team earned district gold both times on the track as seniors Clayton Gremaud, James Unterreiner and junior Kale Meyer were each on the district championship 800 and 1,600 relay teams.
Indians junior Jackson Seabaugh joined those three on the 800 team for a 1:35.03 finish, while sophomore Carter Hennemann was on the first-place 1,600 squad, which recorded a time of 3:39.21.
As for St. Vincent’s 3,200 team, the Indians took second overall at 9:43.92 and are heading to sectionals. The relay squad is made up of seniors Jace Henneman, Ethan Hotop, sophomore Carter Herman and freshman Luke Ryan.
Individually, both Carter Hennemann and Hotop qualified for sectionals in two individual events. Henneman did so in the 800 (second place at 2:07.44) and 1600 (second at 4:38.36), while Hotop advanced to sectionals in the 1,600 (fourth at 5:12.91) as well as the 3,200 (second at 11:10.56).
Lastly on the track, Gremaud, Ryan and Seabaugh are also set to compete at sectionals individually in the 400, 3200 and 100, respectively. St. Vincent junior Kellan Pitts was the only Indian to qualify for this weekend’s sectional meet on the field in the high jump (third place at 5-8) and triple jump (fourth at 36-3.5).
All of the Indians listed above will now compete in the Class 1 Sectional 1 Meet on Saturday at Hillsboro. The Class 1 state meet is set for May 23-24 in Jefferson City.
