Nothing new: Rangers rock, roll to another regional crown
Winning is not just some worthless mantra for the Reading girls track team, it is a walk they walk and under Deb Price’s watch something that is becoming an expectation they continue to meet.
At Hillsdale College on Saturday the Ranger girls won their 11th regional title with Price in charge, by a 56-point margin over runner-up Hillsdale Academy, with great relay results and five individual regional champions leading the way.
The Rangers and Colts both qualified for the MITCA team state championships at Gobles High School next weekend, as did the Reading boys who finished second on Saturday — but it was Price's squad that stole the spotlight from beginning to end.
"Somebody asked me, 'How do you keep getting these girls?' and I really don't know, I just get talented girls and we've just been lucky to have a successful program here for the last 10 or 15 years. I don't know where they're all coming from — we joke and say it must be in the water here in Reading," Price said. "It's a lot fun. It's nice to have so many girls; I have a lot of sprinters who are not just average, but better than average so it's nice with those three sprint relays not to have to run the same girls in everything."
The relays were just one of the Rangers strong points, as they won the 400 meter and 800 meter relays, while taking third in the 1600.
From an individual standpoint, junior Tessa Pridegeon may have been the star of the meet, winning the 400 dash by shaving several seconds off her previous PR, and also taking home the title in the 200. She was also a member of the winning 800 relay team.
Brooke Schmucker stockpiled points for Reading in field events, winning the shot put and taking third in the discus and teammate AlexMailahn cleared 9-6 in the pole vault to win the event and qualify for the state meet, where Price said "she has a shot at doing some things."
Jamie Newell was the runner- up in the discus throw and Nicole Marsh was right behind Mailahn in the pole vault as the Rangers jumped out to a sizable lead from the get-go.
The final individual champion for the Rangers was Shawna Smith, who won the 300 hurdles, to go with a runner- up finish in the 100 dash. While the upperclassmen carried the team, Price said it was a talented group of youngsters that put her girls over the top.
"I knew we had a chance of doing well this year because we just had so much depth and we have the field events and a lot of others covered. We did lose Whitney (Thorpe) from last year which was huge, but I don't know — we've had some (underclassmen) come in, with Kelsey Duryea doing a nice job in the distance, and little Brittany Couch who has done an awesome job for us," she said. "I think the big thing is we have the depth, so in some events we were able to take two or three places which scores a lot of points."
The Hillsdale Academy girls beat out third place Athens by 9.5 points, despite having just one individual winner.
That winner was sophomore Heather Lantis in the discus.
The Colts were also strong in relays, as Mike Robert's girls won the 1600 and 3200 relays, while taking second in the 400.
Elyse Lisznyai took third in both the one and two mile runs for the Academy.
