Wildcat boys run away with team title at home invitational

Louisburg’s (from left) Blue Caplinger, Brandon Cooper, Ben Wiedenmann and Justin Collins battle it out in the 100-meter dash last Thursday at the Louisburg Invitational.

The Louisburg boys track and field team ran away with its home invitational title, both figuratively and literally.

Louisburg won six events, including four on the track, and the Wildcats came away with several medals as they racked up 192 points to win the Louisburg Invitational. Spring Hill was runner-up with 163 as the Wildcats won by nearly 30 points.

“I thought we came out and did what we needed to do,” Louisburg coach Andy Wright said. “Over half of the athletes got their personal record for the year and I was excited to see us build some confidence.”

The Wildcats had a lot of speed on display as they won both the 100 and 200-meter dashes, along with 4×100-meter relay.

Sophomore Justin Collins had a big day as he won the 100-meter dash in 11.47 seconds and the Wildcats swept the first four places. Senior Brandon Cooper (11.52) was second, senior Blue Caplinger was third (11.64) and sophomore Ben Wiedenmann was fourth (11.71.)

Caplinger went on to win the 200 dash in 23.27 seconds and edged Osawatomie’s Thaid Timblin by .01 seconds. Wiedenmann went on to medal third in 23.55.

The 4×100 relay team of Collins, Caplinger, Wiedenmann and Cooper blew away the competition as they took gold in 44.24 seconds.

“Every week we have someone different winning the 100,” Wright said. “That is fantastic. As a coach, it is so nice to have 4-5 sprinters that can push each other every week at practices and in meets. The 4×100 team is slowly improving throughout the year, but we still need to clean up our handoffs.”

In the field events, Louisburg went 1-2 in the pole vault as junior Trent Martin had his best day of the season as he cleared 13 feet to win the event for the first time this season. Sophomore Luke Faulkner was second at 12-6.

“Trent is working his way back up to his personal record, so it was good for him to get some momentum with the win,” Wright said. “He will keep working hard, and I expect to see him keep climbing.”

Junior Carter Anglin was another gold medal winner for Louisburg as he captured the discus title with a throw of 143 feet, 2 inches and senior teammate Kiefer Tucker was second at 130-2. Junior Brayden White also scored points in the event with a toss of 115-10 and took fourth.

Tucker also picked up a medal in the shot put as he was runner-up with a mark of 41-9.25. White (40-2) and Jonathan DePriest (38-2.75) also scored points as they were fifth and sixth, respectively.

The Wildcats continued their throwing success in the javelin as they had two athletes earn medals. Junior Michael Waldron recorded a throw of 163-8 and took second overall, while sophomore Jay Scollin had a toss of 144-8 to take third.

Louisburg was also able to score points in the jump as junior Indy Strumillo was third in the triple jump with a mark of 37-0.25. Freshmen Isaac Guetterman (36-8.25) and Will Finestead (36-1.75) took fifth and sixth, respectively.

Freshman Hayden Feikert had his best day in the long jump as he recorded a leap of 19-8 to finish runner-up by just .25 inches. Martin finished fourth with a mark of 19-2.75 and Finestead was sixth at 18-10.25.

Back on the track, freshman Tom Koontz medaled in both hurdle events. Koontz was second in the 300-meter hurdles in 43.57 seconds and third in the 110 hurdles in 17.56.

Senior Chris Williams also earned a runner-up performance in the 400-meter dash in 52.33 seconds.

In the distance races, junior Anthony Davis finished second in the 1,600-meter run in a time of 5 minutes and 7 seconds. Freshmen Ryan Rogers (5:15) and Caden Bradshaw (5:20) also scored points as they took fifth and sixth, respectively.

The same three runners also fared well in the 800 run. Davis medaled third in 2:20, while Bradshaw was fourth in 2:23 and Rogers was fifth in 2:24.

Louisburg also ended the meet on a strong note as the Wildcat 4×100 throwers relay took gold as the team of Waldron, Tucker, DePriest and Austin Moore won in 47.52 seconds.

The Wildcats return to action today as they travel to the Prairie View Invitational. The meet is set to begin at 3:30 p.m.

Other results are:

100 dash: Charlie Koontz, 14^th, 12.37

200 dash: Skyler Tinsley, 10^th, 25.21; Cooper Hipp, 13^th, 25.85

400 dash: Dylan Armstrong, 8^th, 56.74; Weston Guetterman, 11^th, 58.91; Isaac Guetterman, 22^nd, 1:03

800 run: Sawyer Richardson, 7^th, 2:28; Gareth Baus, 16^th, 2:47

1,600 run: Richardson, 7^th, 5:24; Baus, 12^th, 6:13

Pole vault: A.J. Reed, 7^th, 9-6; Caleb Shaughnessy, 12^th, 8-6

Long Jump: Indy Strumillo, 11^th, 17-4.75; W. Guetterman, 15^th, 17-0

Triple jump: W. Guetterman, 8^th, 35-10.5

Shot put: Cole Evans, 7^th, 37-9.5; Will Patterson, 27^th, 30-3

Discus: Chase Pritchard, 9^th, 105-9; Jonathan DePriest, 10^th, 102-2

Javelin: Reed, 8^th, 135-11; Austin Moore, 12^th, 130-1; Tyler Detherage, 26^th, 86-3

Wildcat relay medals at KU Relays

Justin Collins, Chris Williams, Blue Caplinger and Ben Wiedenmann had a big day at the Kansas Relays on Friday and Saturday in Lawrence.

The quartet competed in the Sunflower Finals of the 4×400-meter relay and the Wildcat team medaled fifth overall in 3 minutes and 30 seconds.

Several other Wildcat athletes competed in the two-day meet and Louisburg coach Andy Wright was pleased with what he saw from his athletes.

“KU Relays was a great experience for our guys,” he said. “We experienced lows and highs that come from high stakes competing. The stage at KU Relays is as big as we are going to see, probably bigger than state as there are the best of the best from multiple state competing, as well as college athletes. This can be an intimidating experience, and I thought that our athletes stepped up to the task and competed well.”

On Saturday, junior Michael Waldron threw the javelin and was 22^nd with a throw of 151-3.

Louisburg opened the meet on Friday as senior Brandon Cooper was 43^rd in the 100 dash in 11.53 seconds. Williams also ran the open 400 and took 29^th in 53.90 seconds.

Collins, Wiedenmann, Cooper and Caplinger also competed in the 4×100 relay, but were disqualified.  

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