Chaparral senior Maddie Fey clinched another trip to the UIL Track and Field State Championships, winning the Class 5A Region III shot put title at Humble ISD’s Turner Stadium on Friday.
Fey’s gold –– notched with a top throw of 160 feet, 1 inch –– was part of a busy 12 hours for Killeen ISD track and field athletes at two locations during Day 1 of a pair of action-packed regional meets.
More Chaparral Lady Bobcats and Bobcats along with Ellison, Killeen and Shoemaker went to work at the 5A Region III meet while Harker Heights’ regional qualifiers headed north to Waco and Midway’s Panther Stadium for the 6A-II meet.
The day included some field event finals and running preliminaries in which the top four from each preliminary heat Friday were compiled to make up the eight-person race finals that are slated for Saturday afternoon.
The top two finishers in those finals advance to the UIL State Championships on May 3-4 at Mike A. Myers Stadium in Austin.
Fey got the state-qualifier ball rolling for KISD’s group, and more state spots could go to KISD runners on Saturday when a number of runners and relays are back on teh track for the finals.
Shoemaker senior Malik Esquerra won his 110 hurdles heat Friday in 14.01 and will be the top seed into the finals. He’ll be joined there by Chaparral’s Andre Mitchell, whose 15.15 got him in as the eighth seed.
Esquerra then had the top time in the 300 hurdles (38.47) in which Killeen’s Timothy Boatner also qualified sixth for the finals with a 39.68.
Killeen’s Aaliyah Barnes is the top seed in the girls 100 dash after crossing in 11.75 during her prelim. Taniya Burke of Chaparral (12.26) also will be in the final as the sixth seed. Barnes later posted a 24.06 in the 200 for the third seed into the finals.
Killeen’s Keyshawn Campbell’s 10.75 in the boys 100 qualified him sixth for the finals, and Chaparral’s Mikayla Strayhorn grabbed a lane in the 100 hurdles finals after posting a 15.25 for the sixth seed.
The Killeen girls 4x100 relay qualified sixth for Saturday’s finals after a time of 48.06 in its preliminary heat, and the Shoemaker (41.14) and Killeen (41.77) boys 4x100 relays qualified fourth and eighth, respectively, for the finals.
Those schools also will have 4x200 relays in the finals after the Roos went 1:26.35 and the Grey Wolves 1:26.49 in the prelims to qualify third and fourth.
Shoemaker’s 4x400 also advanced to Day 2, qualifying sixth in a time of 3:20.35.
Not making it to Day 2 but still demonstrating some serious speed and skill on the track were the Lady Eagles 4x200 and 4x400 relay teams, The Eagles’ 4x100 and 4x200 relays, and Chaparral’s Mikayla Strayhorn in the 300 hurdles and Trinity Brown in the 400.
Brown narrowly missed a state spot in the triple jump, placing third with a 38-5¼. The second-place jumper had a 38-6½. Killeen’s Ahmerus Walker (35-2¾) was 14th.
Shoemaker’s Kareem Edmon registered a personal-best throw of 54 feet even and placed third in the shot put, Greg Dumas leaped 45-5½ and Willie Thomas recorded a 42-½ to place fourth and 11th in the triple jump, and Chaparral’s Amone Tolliver (44-4½) was seventh in the triple jump to close their seasons in those events.
Not too far from where she’ll continue her career at Baylor, Harker Heights senior Ella Perry circled the oval eight times at Midway ISD’s Panther Stadium in Waco in her final high school 3,200-meter race and added one last bit of history to her chapter by clocking a school-record 10:52.40 for fourth place at the Class 6A Region II meet.
Perry, a three-time cross country state qualifier, is also in the field Saturday for the 1,600.
Knights senior Jaden Cook capped his standout season with a ninth-place finish in the discus.
In the running prelims, the Lady Knights 4x200 relay advanced to the final with a seventh-place seed time of 1:40.96.
Check back for a story later this weekend on Day 2 of the regional meets.
