Expectations high as Marion County teams gear up for state track and field meet

May 18—FAIRMONT — After making it this far, nobody wants to come up short right before the finish line.

One meet remains in the high school track season, the state meet capping off the year at Laidley Field on May 19 and May 20. Over the course of the two days of competition, champions will be crowned and dreams fulfilled for some of the athletes there, with good representation coming from Marion County's three high schools.

Each school is sending over 20 student athletes to Charleston — North Marion 21, Fairmont Senior 23, and East Fairmont 28 — after each team had impressive regional performances.

Fairmont Senior's crop of athletes is headlined by their relay teams, three of which claimed first place at regionals.

"I thought regionals was mostly a success," Fairmont Senior head coach Dayton McVicker said. "We qualified all 10 relays, five girls and five boy relays, and just about every individual we thought could go to states did, with a couple exceptions. I was really happy with how the entire meet went and I think it set us up to have a really good showing down in Charleston this weekend."

The Polar Bear boys' 4x800 relay team came in second place in last year's state meet, and their girls' 4x100 meter and 4x200 meter teams also got medals, a gold in the 4x100 and silver in 4x200.

Overall, Fairmont Senior came in fourth in total points on the girls side last season, and seventh on the boys side, a level of success they would like to sustain, if not exceed.

"A big emphasis for us, we qualified all 10 relays for states, and now we'd like all 10 of those relays to earn all-state honors," McVicker said. "All 10 are projected to so I think that's something we could certainly do, with a few of them competing for titles. Our girls 4x100, 4x200, shuttles, and our boys shuttles and 4x400 all have genuine chances at winning a state title. We're hoping that all 10 relays at least get all-state."

Fairmont Senior's program is at a crossroad, sending off an impactful group of seniors while also ushering in a new era of hopeful Polar Bear track stars.

"We have a lot of seniors going down, so it's kind of a culmination of a lot of years of hard work," McVicker said. "We have three girls, Paytyn Neal, Maddie Awbrey and Marin Parker who have been part of back-to-back 4x100 state championship teams. So they're going down there with about as much experience as you can have.

"On the other end of it, we have some of the best track athletes that I've seen in many years here as true freshmen. About four of them on the girls side and two on the guys side. So there's a bright future too, where these kids are going down and they'll get their first ever state meet experience. It's a just a blend of tons of seniors and freshmen, and they've just worked together really well."

East Fairmont prepares for the trek down south with the highest head count of the three schools, and as would be expected, such a high number of athletes equates to a lot of different events in which the Bees will be represented.

"I think for what we have, our kids performed pretty well at regionals," East Fairmont girls head coach Shane Eakle said. "We had a lot of kids with PR's in heights and vaults and runs. When you're running your best, or your jumping or throwing your best, you can't ask for much more than that.

"Getting as many as we did, it was pretty good, we knew we'd have to do it as a team, with relays and things like that. We qualified every relay I think but the boys 4x100."

East Fairmont is coming off a year where they had a presence in Charleston, finishing 20th among all girls teams and 16th among boys teams, and rather than identifying one true strength going into this year's meet, Eakle pointed to a number of events and athletes that he thinks can add up to a well-rounded showing.

Those athletes included Dakota Dammeyer, who qualified for the shot put and discus throw, and different runners who are eager to compete.

"Dakota [Dammeyer], he's coming down there and he medaled for us last year as a sophomore so we're looking forward to him going down," Eakle said. "Some of our relays, if we run well we have an opportunity to grab some medals. We've got a shot with Breonna [Pheasant] in the 100 open, Taylor Nichols in the 200 open.

"We've got running events where we've got a kid here or there. Maybe an Emma Moore in the 100 high hurdle. She'd have to run a good time for her but maybe she could sneak a good time in and make the finals. Drew Moore has got a shot in the 800 to get in the top eight."

This year's Bees team is a truly young unit. Only four seniors — Zoie Pheasant, Vaughn Frederick, Tyson Nicholas and Chris May — are competing at state for East out of their 28 competitors.

The youth of East Fairmont means there's teaching opportunities around every corner and the Bees hope to turn a big corner this weekend.

"I do think that, especially our younger kids, the growing up process, coming from middle school and coming in first or second in a small meet and then running at the meets here and barely making finals, it's just getting them ingrained to the idea that it's a personal race all the time," Eakle said. "'I want to throw better, jump further,' and I think they responded, some of the young kids we've had to lean on in some of our relays and they've stepped up.

"The older kids have kind of anchored things but our young kids have done a nice job of stepping up into some of those roles. You look at a Tony Comas in the 4x800 as a freshman, the list goes on and on. It'll be an exciting experience for them here."

North Marion prepares for the state meet after coming closest than any other team of un-seating first-place Winfield, as the Huskies girls took the silver medal as a team for the second-straight year. Now, North is back in the hunt for the gold.

"We stepped it up in regionals," North Marion Huskies girls head coach Jeff Crane said. "We wanted to win regionals, but a lot of our relay teams improved their times, 4x400, shuttles, 4x100, it was just a process where you saw them all pick it up. We talk about it, this time of the year it's about the team that's performing the best now. What you've done in the past is not going to help you."

North Marion's boys finished with the ninth-highest point total of all teams last year in their own right. This year, they will compete in the 4x110 shuttle hurdles, and the 4x800 relay in Charleston, while Jeffrey Cowger also competes individually in the 110 meter hurdles.

For the girls, the strength of the Huskies in years past has been their relays. They won the 4x200 last year, and came in second in both the 4x400 and 4x102.5 shuttle hurdles, but North is prepared to compete for top spots in a variety of individual events this year too, including field events like the long jump, where Cierra Parker was the state champion last year.

Picking up points in such events and showing their "depth" could go a long way towards North having their best meet yet.

"Our relays do have a chance to get some places, but our strongest spot is definitely going to come from Rylee Delovich in the 100 hurdles and the 300, and she anchors our shuttle team," Crane said. "But you look around, and Maylie Bland is ranked No. 1 going into the pole vault. Gabby [Conaway]'s up there in the high jump. Cierra [Parker] in the long jump. We've got some individual people. Trinity [Hine] in the 100 meter and the 400, we have some individual spots that could shine.

"It's a team thing, we talk about depth, doing a lot of different things, and that's what we're doing now. We got the high jump, long jump, pole vault, a shot-putter out there, and then there's hurdles and relays. Where we are, we'll try to put on a show for them."

Reach Nick Henthorn at 304-367-2548, on Twitter @nfhenthorn_135 or by email at nhenthorn@timeswv.com.