By John Bombatch
DAYTON — In the two running finals, a pair of Beavercreek 3,200-meter relay teams punched their respective tickets to the state championships.
First, the Beavercreek girls quartet of senior Cameron Baird, juniors Jordan Grant and Lauren Shuman, and sophomore anchor Stephanie Pierce finished third with a time of 9:32.05 — nearly eight full seconds slower than their district seeding time — to earn themselves a trip to Columbus.
The foursome had turned a 9:24.71 time at last week’s district meet on the same track.
Moments later, the Beavercreek boys junior foursome of Brad Klingbeil, Ian Johnson, Ben Ewert and Jacob Benigno ran nine seconds quicker than their district seeding time, and finished fourth to also book themselves a trip to Columbus.
“Ben and I went last year, but these guys are coming with us this time,” said Johnson. “We’ll be back next year, too. We ran about 8 (minutes) flat today, which is our season’s best. And I think we’ve got a lot more left in the tank, too.”
Beavercreek’s boys contingent finished in 8:01.16. Their district seed time had been 8:10.99. Had they run that district number at regionals, the Beavers would’ve wound up seventh and would be staying home on June 3-4 for the state track and field championships in Columbus.
The following area runners are scheduled to compete in Friday’s D-I regional running finals. (The top-4 in each of Friday’s events will also move on to the state meet.):
Boys
110 Hurdles — Mathew Riekens, Beavercreek; 1,600 run — Ben Ewert, Beavercreek; 800 run — Ian Johnson, Beavercreek; 3,200 run — Ewert, Beavercreek; Shot Put — Sam Sherwood, Fairborn.
Girls
100 Dash — Tatum Washington, Xenia; 1,600 run — Lauren Shuman, Beavercreek; 800 run — Stephanie Pierce, Beavercreek, Jordan Grant, Beavercreek; Pole Vault — Makensie Wasson, Beavercreek, Riley Allen, Bellbrook.
