Eagles star in 3A regionals
YAKIMA — There wasn’t a whole lot for 3A athletes to do at the Eastern Regional track meet at Zaepfel Stadium.
And the out-numbered Great Spokane League athletes didn’t do a lot on the cold, windy Friday night.
But almost everything that was done was done by West Valley athletes.
The Eagles accounted for all three of the wins and six of the nine state berths as the top three in each event advanced to state next weekend in Pasco.
The 3A schools didn’t have any running preliminaries and only raced the 3,200-meters, with the Mid-Valley sweeping both races.
There were seven field-event finals and Rashad Toussaint had a clutch win in the long jump, Ryan Flint an easy win in the shot put and Kayla Mainer a dominating win in the high jump for West Valley.
Toussaint, a heavy favorite coming in, scratched on his first two attempts jumping with the wind. Then he came through by soaring 22 feet, 9.5 inches, just 2.5 inches short of his personal record.
“It was the wind,” the junior said. “It threw me off big time. When I scratched the first two I was real nervous.”
His big jump was a relief and it took the edge off.
“I was hoping to go over 23, to tell you the truth, because of the wind,” he said. “My coach said I had it won, take it easy and have fun.”
But he couldn’t come up with another big jump.
Flint got his big one in, 54-561/2 , but couldn’t get another half-inch to match his PR. Teammate Tiarik Yarborough did, however, improving on four straight throws to finish second at 53-3 3/4 .
That was big for Yarborough, a junior, who didn’t have a good district meet with a 50-8.5 throw, a number that would not have qualified for state.
“I was a little bit nervous,” he said. “I wasn’t getting my feet under me. I just forgot about it and worked hard with Coach (Howard) Dolphin in practice.”
Said Flint: “We were seeded 1-2 coming in and Tiarik had a 52-footer before. It was just a matter of throwing well today.”
Mainer came up just short of matching her career best 5-7 and easily cleared 5-6.
“I’m happy but I’m not satisfied,” said Mainer, who earlier qualified for state by finishing second in the long jump.
“Basically it’s the high jump because that’s what I focus on. Before today I was hoping to get 5-7 or 5-8. It was a long bus ride but my lefts felt good.”
The long jump was 16-2 3/4 into the wind, about seven inches short of a PR.
“That’s not bad, it’s only about my fourth meet,” said Mainer, who tried the long jump earlier to help the team in a dual meet.
“Coach (Rick) Kuhl said it was my choice at district. He said not to do it if it would mess me up. It’s my fun event. I haven’t practiced it at all, maybe once or twice.”
The meet continues at 11 a.m. today with field events with running finals starting at noon.