By David Paulsen
SPORTS CORRESPONDENT
With top two finishes in nine of the 14 events, the Waterford High School girls track and field squad won the Southern Lakes Conference Relays Monday at Elkhorn.
The Wolverine girls tallied 107 points, with Lake Geneva Badger placing second with 97.
“The girls did an awesome job,” head coach Jerry Glisch said. “I was impressed with everybody.”
In the relay format, teams enter three or four athletes in all events, with the combined times and distances making up the team total. In a few races, the relays are run as they normally would.
Glisch noted the relay format tests the entire team.
“It really shows our depth,” Glisch added.
The Wolverine boys took third in a tight boys’ race. Badger won the boys relays with 93 points, followed by Westosha Central with 90 and Waterford with 87.
“It’s pretty clear after (this meet) that it’s going to be a dogfight (in the SLC),” Glisch said. “I thought (our boys) did a fantastic job. That was a nice statement our guys made.”
In the girls’ relays, Waterford won the 100-meter hurdles relay, the 4-by-100, the 800 sprint medley, the 4-by-200 and the high jump relay.
In the 100-meter hurdles relay, Corey Pfankuch finished third overall in 18.07 seconds. Holly Neubauer was sixth in 18.63 and Sydney Lindner 10th in 19.29.
The 4-by-100 relay team of Hannah Zimmerman, Samantha Jahnke, Valerie Knurr and Lauren Dziak won in 52.83, while the 4-by-200 team of Zimmerman, Maddy Maerzke, Knurr and Dziak turned in a winning time of 1:54.19.
In the 800 sprint medley, Jahnke, Natalie Erickson, Jenny Gilbreath and Dziak teamed up to win in 1:56.87. That was .03 faster than Union Grove. Gilbreath got the win with her lean at the finish line.
“That was a tough race,” Glisch said. “That was fun to watch.”
By clearing four feet 10 inches, Holly Neubauer and Valerie Knurr finished tied for second in the high jump. The third member of that relay, Sarah Edson, was sixth. She cleared 4-08.
The Wolverine girls earned second-place finishes in the distance medley, the 300-meter hurdles relay, the 1,600 sprint medley and the 4-by-400 meter relay.
The Wolverine boys won four relays and placed second in two others.
In the 110-meter hurdles relay, Waterford tied for first with Badger. Collin Chart ws second in 16.93 seconds, Jerome Sindberg fifth in 17.36 seconds, and Gabriel Gasiorowski sixth in 17.42.
The same threesome earned a win in the 300-meter hurdles relay, with Chart placing fifth (45.21), Gasiorowski seventh (45.73) and Sindberg ninth (46.32).
The other two victories for the Wolverine boys came in the shot put relay and the discus relay.
In the shotput, Brandon Schindler had the longest heave at 49 feet 10 inches, with Brandon Miller in second with a throw of 48-03.5. Alek Henderson was fourth with a throw of 45.08, giving Waterford three of the top four distances.
Henderson won the discus with a throw of 141-05, nearly five feet farther than the second-place finisher. Miller was eighth with a distance of 119-07 and Schindler 11th with 114-00.
Henderson’s throw was a huge personal record.
“He popped a huge throw,” Glisch said.
Glisch added that the boys’ throws group is by far the best group he has had at Waterford since he has been coaching there.
The two second-place finishes for the boys came in the distance medley and the 1,600 sprint medley.
Glisch said he told both squads prior to the meet to control the things they could control, and they managed that well.
“The conditions were not the best,” he said.
Both squads will compete in the Westosha Central Invitational today.
Next week, the Wolverines will be at the Janesville Craig Invitational on Friday, April 26.
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