Lady Wildcats, boys teams both finish 7th in track regionals

There were some standout individual efforts Friday by Wayland athletes in the Division 2 regional meet at Houseman Field in Grand Rapids.

Four Wildcat boys and Lady Wildcat 800-meter runner Maggie Whitney have qualified for the state meet June 1 and 2.

Both teams finished seventh among 15 years. The boys scored 40.5 points while Grand Rapids Christian won it with 125. The Lady Wildcats scored 35 while Forest Hills Eastern amassed 144 for the regional team title. Four of the top five finishers were members of the O-K Gold Conference.

Whitney, a junior, was regional champion in the 800 with a blistering time of 2:17.9. Her time was almost three seconds faster than the school record of 2:20.8, set in 2006 by Jessica Armstrong.

Sophomore Caleb Wolf took second in the 400 meters with a time of 51.95 seconds and Lee Anderson was runner-up in the 300-meter intermediate hurdles with a school-record time of 40.49 seconds.

Wolf and Anderson joined Anthony Muscarella and Seth Sevenski-Popma to take second in the 1600-meter relay in 3:30.9.

Not qualifying for the state meet, but turning in quality performances were:

• • Freshman Rylee Cronkright, sixth in the open 1600, with her personal best of 5:34.97, and sixth in the 3200 with a personal best 12:12.18.
  • Sophomore Caleb Pletcher with a personal best 2:08.03, good for eighth in the open 800 and he tied and teammate Cory Ainsworth tied for seventh in the high jump at 5-7.
  • Freshman Corrina Courser, a personal best 48.80 in the 300 intermediate hurdles, good for fourth.
  • A fifth-place finish by Whitney, Hannah Rybiski, Abigail Hasse and Courser in the 1600 relay, in 4:28.14.
  • A fifth-place finish by the 3200 relay team of Zoe Antel, Cronkright, Hasse and Whitney, in 10:25.7.
  • Sophomore Devin Jakey was sixth in the long jump with a personal best leap of 19-09.25.
  • Mckenna Dutkiewicz was fifth in the discus with a personal best 89-11.

PHOTOS: Anthony Muscarella is about to hand the baton to Seth Sevenski-Popma (bottom, right) for the last leg of the 160-meter relay.

Maggie Whitney  (Photos courtesy Mark Muscarella and Terry Ellis)