City’s Mild Rivals Split First Meet Lake City Boys, Cda Girls Win

Refreshingly absent from the first high school track and field meet between the intracity schools Tuesday afternoon was the intensity and emotion of the inaugural football or boys basketball games.

There was no finger-pointing or trash talking at Viking Field. Instead there was congratulatory handshakes, hugs and smiles between both teams.

And that’s not only welcomed but will be encouraged by Lake City coach Donna Messenger and Coeur d’Alene coach Bryan Rasmussen. As long as they’re head coaches dual meets between the sister schools will carry a friendly undertone.

“It’s not an adversarial relationship between the (head coaches),” Rasmussen said. “It’s a real constructive rivalry and I don’t see it being nothing but that in the future.”

The team results didn’t surprise the coaches either. Lake City’s boys nearly doubled their victory margin, topping Coeur d’Alene 96-50. Coeur d’Alene’s girls made it a split with an 80-57 victory.

Leading the Lake City boys was junior Matt Lider and senior long-distance runner Chris Gossett.

Lider collected four firsts. The Timberwolf posted individual wins in the high jump (6 feet) and long jump (19-4) and ran opening legs on the winning 400 (46.63) and medley (3:55.87) relays.

“It was a new experience, new competition for both schools,” Lider said of the meet. “I was pumped up because I wanted to beat (Coeur d’Alene).”

Gossett expected a showdown against CdA senior Chris Cole. But Cole skipped the meet to prepare for the prestigious Pasco Invitational on Saturday. Gossett and Cole will go head-to-head there.

Gossett was practically by himself Tuesday as he scored easy wins in the 1,600 (4:48.32) and 3,200 (10:28.86).

“I tried to run a pace race in the 3,200,” Gossett said. “I tried a fast pace in the 1,600 and wanted to see how long I could keep it up. But I didn’t keep it up as long as I’d like.”

One of the most entertaining boys races came in the 800 relay, where both LC and CdA figure to push each other all season.

CdA sprinter Jason Hicks held off fastclosing T-Wolf Jason Ryan in the final leg as the Viks improved their season best by one-tenth of a second in 1:35.5. Hicks outleaned Ryan at the tape as LC finished one-tenth of a second behind CdA.

Hicks also had victories in the 200 (23.9) and 400 (54.2).

Ryan, senior transfer from Mead, took first in the 100 (11.99) and ran the anchor leg on the winning 400 relay and the second leg on the victorious 1,600 relay (3:41.07).

Though there weren’t many outstanding marks, Messenger saw much improvement in her teams.

“There were personal bests all over for both teams,” Messenger said.

“Lake City is very deep in the distances and Lake City’s depth overall made for some combination points,” Rasmussen said. “That’s tough to overcome.”

Senior sprinter-jumper Lisa Dalhberg led the Vik girls with four firsts. She had individual wins in the 100 (13.6), 200 (28.34) and long jump (14-10 1/2) and ran the anchor leg on the winning 800 relay (1:57.5).

Dahlberg wasn’t overly impressed with her marks, but was delighted to beat her friends at LC.

“She’s really talented,” Rasmussen said of Dahlberg. “Overall I thought our girls really matured in this meet. After Dahlberg most of our points came from sophomores and freshmen.”