Belcher racks up points for Lady Cats

Louisburg’s Hanna Becker hands off to anchor Bailey Belcher in the final leg of the 4×100-meter relay Thursday during the Frontier League meet in Spring Hill. The Lady Cat relay team finished third.

SPRING HILL – As just a freshman, Bailey Belcher continues to burn up the track for the Louisburg girls track and field team.

Belcher helped score 26 points for the Lady Cats during the Frontier League track meet Thursday in Spring Hill. She finished runner-up in both the 100- and 200-meter dashes and later helped the 4×100-meter relay to a third-place finish.

Belcher also scored a few points in the field events as she took fourth in the high jump when she cleared a season-best 4 feet and 10 inches.

Outside of the freshman, Louisburg had a little tougher time coming up with points as it finished sixth with 46.5 points. Baldwin won the meet the 198 points and Paola was second with 173.5.

In the preliminaries of the 100 dash, Belcher recorded the fastest time but was edged out in the finals by De Soto’s Tori Marshall. Belcher ran a time of 13.18 seconds to Marshall’s 13.08.

Marshall, a senior, once again got the better of Belcher, but not by much. Marshall won the 200 dash in 27.03 and Belcher was second in 27.33. The Louisburg freshman is posting strong finishes despite recovering from a foot injury three weeks ago.

Belcher joined Ashley Ruder, Megan Lemke and Hanna Becker to run the 4×100 relay. The Lady Cat team ran a time of 52.76 to take third.

Also on the track, the 4×400 relay of Kaitlyn Gaza, Lemke, Ruder and Makenzie Kallevig also took third in 4 minutes and 21 seconds. Kallevig, Liz Hildreth, Isabelle Holtzen and Lauren Becker ran the 4×800 relay in 11:26 and came in fifth.

In the sprints, Ruder also scored some points in the 200 dash as she took seventh in 29.78 and Gaza was seventh in the 400 dash in 1:05.

Holtzen continued her improvement in the pole vault as she cleared 8-6, which was a new personal record. The Louisburg freshman came in fourth and junior teammate McKinley Mathews was seventh as she cleared 8-0.

Freshman Haley Earl finished fifth in the triple jump with a mark of 30-4, and another freshman, Sophie McMullen had a throw of 99-8 in the discus to take sixth.

The Lady Cats will try and continue their season Thursday when they travel to Prairie View for the Class 4A regional meet. The meet begins at 3 p.m., and the top four placers in each event will qualify for state.