Lady Indians get ready, set for state meet
DU QUOIN - The Du Quoin High School girls track and field team begins competition at the IHSA's Class 1A state meet with preliminaries on Thursday at Charleston's O'Brien Stadium with the hopes of sending events on to Saturday's finals.
While the Lady Indians aren't lacking in quality, they definitely have an abundance of quantity in Thursday's part of the meet, which begins at 10 a.m. on the Eastern Illinois University campus.
"It's always fun to take girls up to state," said Du Quoin coach Shane Boyett. "We'll try to compete and I think we have a chance to place and make it to Saturday in a few events, at least that's our goal. We'll have a good time going up there."
Gabby Alongi is involved in the 400 and 800 and could also run in the 4x800 relay. Madison Davis will also be busy as she's qualified in the 100 and 200 dashes and is part of the 4x100 relay that used a second chance at sectionals to advance.
"The way it's falling, we're going to try Gabby in the 800 and 400," Boyett said. "And if we run our best time ever in the 3,200 relay, we have a shot. We're going to try. We'll give it our best shot."
Andrea Lopez is guaranteed to run on Saturday as she's in the two-mile race that uses section heats instead of prelims. But on Thursday she'll run the mile and the 4x800, with Jacqueline Crain also in the 800 with Alongi and Bailey Harsy running the 100-meter hurdles.
The field events are unique in that pole vault and high jump get separated by a number of athletes Thursday, then compete again Saturday. Maddie Robison and Delaynie Dearmond both get that experience in pole vault and Elizabeth Bird gets to start in the high jump.
Even more unique are the throwing events where the best marks from Thursday not only qualify an athlete for Saturday but carry over and could possibly be the winning distances. Freshman Aubrey Barwick gets to compete in both discus and shot put in the prelims.
Du Quoin has Olivia Cravens, Ella Hirsch, Bailey Harsy, Hope Stewart and Skye Westerhouse available for relay spots along with Alongi, Crain, Davis and Lopez. Cravens, Stewart, Lopez and Westerhouse are all seniors.
"We have a lot of athletes going for the first time," Boyett said. "We have some freshmen that get to run up there. That's always encouraging. It will be a different world up there for them, but it will be a good time.
"Other than the freshmen, a lot of them going have been there before and they should know what to expect. They'll perform well. They've performed well all year so I wouldn't expect anything else."
Pinckneyville's Dakota Krone is qualified for long jump and triple jump and the Lady Panthers are also competing in the 4x100 and 4x400 relays with Krone, Shania Opp, Connie Moll and Kenzie Rushing. Moll is also running the 300 hurdles and Rushing is in the 400 dash.