Bulldogs go deep to win county

COLDWATER - The consensus was that Saturday was a much better day than Thursday for the conclusion of the Mercer County Knights of Columbus Track and Field Meet.

Celina could attest to the better conditions as the Bulldogs swept the high school division team titles at Cavalier Stadium in Coldwater.

The Bulldog boys and girls won four events each on Saturday, but the depth of scoring two and sometimes three athletes per individual event helped compile the points. The Celina girls tallied 152 1/2 points, 63 more than runner-up Coldwater and the Bulldog boys' 152 points outdistanced second-place St. Henry's 113 points.

"Across the board, the county is always a great meet to run," Celina coach Eric Wagner said. "I've said all along our depth keeps making us come out on top of these meets. ... Getting those second, third and fourth-place finishes add up (in the points standings). Lot of good performances and our good people were good again."

Lauren McDonough paced the Celina girls and got ready for a big battle in the WBL meet later this week by winning the 1,600- and 3,200-meter runs, giving her three titles for the meet after having helped win the 4x800 relay on Tuesday. Paige Sutter completed a sweep of the throwing events. After having won the discus on Tuesday, the Celina senior broke 40 feet in the shot put, winning with a top effort of 41-2 1/2 with teammate Kaeli Schrolucke again finishing second. Kendall Gilmore added the fourth win for the Celina girls with a 10-foot effort in the pole vault.

Tyler Ross also had a Bulldog sweep of the throwing events on the boys' side as he battled teammate Ian Hawkins in the discus, topping out at 139-2 3/4 to go along with his shot put victory earlier in the week. The Celina boys also swept all three sprint relays.

The big wins weren't just limited to Celina. Parkway's Sydney Crouch, who had won the long jump on Tuesday, added two wins on Saturday. Crouch overtook Fort Recovery's Cassidy Martin down the stretch to win the 400 by a margin of 0.45 seconds and later picked up the win in the 200 dash to earn three championship medals at the meet. Marion Local's Kylie Albers won the 100 dash and added the 300 hurdles title later in the day.

Coldwater's Zach Klosterman had a great day in his final meet on his home track, sweeping the 110 and 300 hurdles. Coldwater's Erin Kremer gave the Cavaliers a victory in the high jump when she won on a tiebreaker after having matched Celina's Alyssa Hoyng with a top leap of five feet. The Coldwater girls' 4x400 relay edged Celina by nearly 2.5 seconds for first place.

On the sprint side, Fort Recovery sophomore Robby LeFevre won the boys' 100 and 200 dashes.

Fort Recovery added a win in the 1,600 from Travis Sutter while the Parkway boys picked up two big wins as Reid Etzcorn edged St. Henry's Colin Mescher at the finish line to win the 400 by a margin of 0.06 seconds and Ben Schlemmer won the 3,200.

Mescher, however, didn't go away without a championship medal after winning the long jump by tying the record leap of 22-3 set by former Redskin Patrick Reichert in 2007. Breanna Schulze took first in the girls' 800.

In the junior high division, Coldwater had a dominating day to win the girls' team title while Marion Local edged Celina 118-112 to capture the boys' championship.

Fort Recovery eighth-grader Kierra Wendel earned a Knights of Columbus "Record Breaker" cap after winning the 400 in 61.47 seconds, shaving 0.34 seconds off the previous record of 61.81 set by former Marion Local standout Allie Thobe in 2011. Wendel added wins in the 100 and 200 dashes on Saturday. Celina's Mekenna Klingshirn swept the hurdle events and Coldwater's Haley Alig won the 800 and 1,600 runs.

Owen Moorman of Fort Recovery also pulled off the sprint triple on Saturday, winning the 100, 200 and 400. Celina's Jaxson Silliman swept the hurdles. St. Henry's Peyton Thomas completed the throwing sweep by winning the discus on Saturday after having won the shot put on Tuesday and Marion Local's Jacob Hartings added a win in the long jump to go along with his county pole vault win on Tuesday.

While Celina heads to Kenton on Wednesday and Friday for the WBL meet, the rest of the county teams travel to New Bremen for the MAC meet on Tuesday and Friday.

Scholarship winners: The Knights of Columbus councils of Mercer County present a $100 book scholarship to one senior athlete from each county school. This year's recipients are Joshua Godby (Celina), Zach Klosterman (Coldwater), Angela Heitkamp (Fort Recovery), Jessie Kramer (Marion Local), Ben Schlemmer (Parkway) and Sean Muhlenkamp (St. Henry).