NEW PALESTINE — The second win of the season for the New Palestine girls track and field team came as easy as 1-2-3.
The Dragons took the top-three spots — all that earned team points —in four events and swept the three relay races in a 103-28 victory over Connersville on Wednesday.
New Palestine won six other events, including four where they picked up the top-two spots.
Just two meets into the regular season, the Dragons are showing good depth.
Sprints, distance and field events, New Palestine showed strength in all aspects against the Spartans.
“I think we are going to be pretty deep,” New Palestine coach Chuck Myers said. “We’re just seeing how it works out, trying new people in different events. I’m excited about the whole team and we’re so young.”
It started with a 1-2-3 finish in the shot put. Sydney Miller had a distance of 35-feet, 1-inch to finish ahead of teammates Faith Hensel (33-7) and Kaiana Fenwick (27-4).
It was followed by top-three placings in the 100-meter dash from Taylor Kelley (13.3 seconds), Maya Hobbs (13.58) and Kennedy Garrett (13.84).
The next race on the docket, the 1,600-meter run, the Dragons took the three ribbon-earning positions with Emma Mann (5:48.8), Emily Adam (6:03) and Bailey Sleppy (6:36).
The final triumphant trio of the night came in the 3,200-meter run with Kendall Mann (12:28), Edie Schwarb (14:31) and Emma Mann (14.32).
The Dragons had 1-2 placings in the discus with Miller (107-10.50) and Fenwick (70-03.50), the 200-meter dash with Lexi Baynes (28.12 ) and Kelley (29.27), as well as, Garrett (14-05.75) and Maya Hobbs (13-04.00) in the long jump and Kelley (4-04.00) and Emily Hunter (4-02.00) in the high jump.
Adam, Megan Collins, Jocelyn Flagle and Emma Mann won the 3,200-meter relay in 11:59.9. Hobbs, Kelley, Hunter and Garrett were winners in the 400-meter relay (56.77) and to wrap up the night, Hobbs, Morgan Stone, Ann Bauer and Baynes won the 1600-meter relay (4:41).
Baynes added a win in the 400-meter dash (1:02) and Adam won the 800-meter run (2:40).
With missing last season due to the pandemic, Myers said he had a lot of girls that are competing in their first varsity meets. The Dragons opened the season last week with a 72-58 win over Yorktown. Wednesday’s meet against Connersville was just the second of the season.
Myers said the Dragons have close to 40 on the team, with a large group of that number coming from the freshmen and sophomore classes.
“It’s exciting. It’s almost like we have a new team after missing last year,” Myers said. “We’re a really young team, which is great. We’re just putting people in events and seeing how they do. They competed really well tonight. It was fantastic to see.
“I think 75-80 percent of the team had their first varsity meet last week. There’s not a lot of experience. That’s the beauty of it. I think we can improve all season. That’s what we’re looking to do, just get better every meet and use the early meets to find out what we’re good at and what we’re not good at, then try to improve on those things and get better each time.”
The distance runners should get better once senior Brenna Shaw returns to the lineup. The state-qualifying distance runner has been out the first couple of meets, but Myers expects her back to add to the team’s overall depth.
Shaw, who will compete at Purdue next season, has qualified for three cross country state finals as well as being a member of New Palestine’s 3,200-meter relay team in the 2019 state finals.
