The Aurora Greenmen track and field team has not competed in many invitationals so far this year. In their biggest invitational of the early spring, the Greenmen girls finished in 10th place at the 69th annual Amherst Comet Relays last Saturday at Amherst High School.
“A lot of them are district competitors and a lot of them are regional competitors so it was a good midseason test to see where we sit right now and what can we work on and what we need to tinker with in our relays,” said girls’ Coach Greg Cicero.
According to the third-year coach, the invitational was a nice sneak preview for the Aurora girls about what the postseason field would look like as several of the top teams competing are in their district in the Ohio High School Athletic Association Division I postseason. The Greenmen girls demonstrated their depth by placing in seven events, including three relays.
Junior Abigail Rogonjic finished in eighth place in the 1600-meter run, clocking a time of 5:36.80.
Senior Sydney Langell captured third place in the 3200-meter run with a personal record of 11:10.47.
“She really put it out there,” noted the third-year coach. “She was going to do as well as she could do in the race, trying to get the win. The girl that won ran an amazing race but Sydney held her own, she was pretty ran even splits throughout the race and she really didn’t settle and kept attacking during the race.”
The quartet of juniors Amelia Kilway, Brooke Palian, Langell and Rogonjic snagged fourth place in the 4×1600 relay with a time of 23:08.93
Junior Brooke Pierce and Olivia Leon, sophomore Khloe Hayward and freshman Sydney Langham teamed up to place sixth in the 4×400 relay with a time of 4:18.85.
Freshman Hope Kanouff joined Pierce, Langham and Hayward to capture sixth place in the 4×800 relay with a time of 10:26.05.
Juniors Isabella Cicero and Isabelle Leindecker formed the “A” team with Hayward and Langham to take fifth place in the distance medley relay and set a school record of 13:14.21.
“I thought our last two legs, Izzy and Ella, did a great job of really bringing the race back to us,” Coach Cicero said. “I did like what I saw from our replacements on that relay on Saturday as well.”
Kanouff tied for seventh place with four other competitors in the high jump by achieving a height of 4 feet, 8 inches.
On the boys’ side, the Greenmen placed 13th as a team but were fueled by standout performances in the individual races by sophomore Luke McGovern in the 100-meter dash and junior Nathan Eminian in the 1600-meter run and the 3200-meter run.
“That is really the story,” said boys’ Coach Chris Radtke. “It is not about the guys who weren’t there, it was the story of the guys who were there.”
McGovern netted fifth place in the 100-meter dash by recording a time of 11.42 seconds.
Eminian secured fourth place in the 1600-meter run with a personal record of 4:33.63.
Eminian then won the 3200-meter run by crossing the finish line with a time of 9:32.01.
“He is another kid that is still figuring out how to run and working on his race strategies and things like that,” said Radtke. “He has got it down in the 3200-meter run pretty well, our distance coaches have developed a great plan for him. The 1600-meter run, he is still figuring it out but a personal record there and scored at Amherst, what is not to like about all of that.”
Following a crossover dual meet at Suburban League Conference rival Hudson on Wednesday, the Greenmen will compete in the Mayfield Invitational on Friday at Mayfield High School at 4 p.m.
