NewJerseyRoundup, Jan. 5 - DyeStat, the internet home of high school track

New Jersey Weekly Roundup
January 5, 2005
By Ed Grant

It is not for nothing that New Jersey is known as the “Relay State” and early action in the current indoor season indicates that this tradition will be well upheld in the new year.

The Marine Corps Classic at the New York Armory on Dec. 27 saw a pair of brilliant races by New Jersey teams, Ridgewood edging Christian Brothers in the boys’ distance medley in 10:26.48 and Colts Neck taking the girls’ event in 12:05.34. Then, at the Millrose Trials on Jan. 3 at Seton Hall University, Old Bridge led the boys’ qualifiers in 3:25.1 and East Orange topped the girls in 3:53.4.

The Ridgewood-CBA duel was just the first of several contests between these traditional distance powers with the next probably coming at the Varsity Classic on the same armory track on Feb. 6 and, if not then, certainly three weeks later at the Easterns. Byron Williams anchored the Maroon win, while CBA, which ran 12:26.81, had cross-country star Chris Horel filling in for its 2005 indoor state 1600 champ, Greg Leach, sidelined at present with a possible stress fracture.

Freshman Briana Jackucewicz, a Footlocker finalists, had a 4:59 anchor for Colts Neck in her first race at the armory since she set an indoor 5K mark as a seventh-grader at the 2004 Nationals. Ashley Higginson ran the opening 1200 for the all-underclass team.

Indoor state 200-meter champ Bryant McCombs anchored the Old Bridge team in 49.8, still a bit short of training after coming back from a football injury. Seton Hall Prep ran 3:25.5 in a different section of the trials with junior Pat Blackie anchoring in 49.1. The third Millrose qualifier was Camden in 3:29.5.

East Orange won a direct duel from Camden Wilson, which ran 3:55.6. Rolanda Bruce anchored East Orange in 57.8, Shaquanda Meylor did the honors for Wilson in 57.2, but Avionne Sloan topped both with a 56.8 to get Camden the third berth in 4:00.6.

Morris Knolls had a pair of brilliant early efforts , following up its 9:32.26 win at the opening Bishop Loughlin meet with a 4:10.21 sprint medley victory at the Marine Corps event. Both were anchored by Lauren Gregory, who also ran fourth in the individual 800 that day in 2:15.43. Kris Herbeck of Steinert was second in that one in 2:15.31.

Roxbury was on its way to a pretty fast distance medley at the Holiday Relays at Drew University on Dec. 23 when the officials failed to get its second girl on the track in time for Kris Stevens to hand off after a 3:45 opening 1200. The Gaels then ran the unseeded section with soph Lauren Penney replacing Stevens and finished with a 12:45.55, anchored by Jenn Ennis. They will get another chance on Jan. 7 in the Morris County Relays at Drew.

Nia Ali of Pleasantville, a senior transfer from West Catholic, followed up her 7.99 55H win at Loughlin with an 8.30 win at the Seton Hall Invitational on Dec. 27 and also won the 200 at that meet in 25.11, as well as the long jump at 17-8 1/4.

The Seton Hall meet also saw a return to action for Brittany Sedberry of Ocean City, the two-time state cross-country champ who was derailed by illness at the end of the 2005 campaign. She lapped the field a couple of times in taking the 3,000-meter run on Dec. 28 in 10:26.22, roughly equivalent to the 11:07.0 3200 run by Eleonora Spinazzi of Montgomery at the opening Fairleigh Dickinson Invitational. (Spinazzi won the 3200 in the Somerset County meet on Dec. 19 at Lehigh University, cheered on by a number of her Italian relatives.)

Ben Massam of Chatham had a great vacation week in the series of meets at Drew, winning a pair of 1600s in 4:24.71 and 4:26.97 and then setting a fieldhouse record of 9:21.82 in the Dec. 31 Passarelli Invitational in a duel with junior Andrew Hanko of Trinrity Christian, who ran 9:30.79. (Hanko shares 30+ first cousins with Jackucewicz.)
There were two good opening marks in the girls’ triple jump from Consandria Walker of Hackensack and Cora Dayon of Trenton. Consandria, who seems to have finally recovered from her severe leg injury at the end of the 2004 outdoor season, had a 36-4 at the Dec. 19 Spiked Shoe Invitational, but Dayon topped that with a 37-5 at the Seton Hall meet. Walker had a 7.1 55M win at the Jan. 3 Zaccone Invitational at Fairleigh Dickinson’s Rothman Center.

Jason Apwah of Roxbury and Kim Standridge of Randolph have dominated the middle distance races at Drew with Apwah recording a 1:24.16 in the 600 and a 2:39.76 in the 1K while also recording a 1:56.52 800 in a pre-season meet at the NY Armory. Standridge has run 1:42.16 in the 600 and 3:05.55 in the 1K.

The first championship meet of the season came on Dec. 29 with the Somerset County affair at Lehigh. Franklin ran away with the boys’ division, 122-79, over Hillsboro, while the Raiders took the girls’ title, 112-66 1/2, from Ridge. Brian Dennis tripled the boys’ distance races for Hillsboro, while Stanley Howard doubled the sprints for Franklin in 6.2 and 23.1. Spinazzi added the 1600 got Montgomery and soph Josefine Kvist took the 400 and 55H for Ridge.

Missing from that meet was Symone O’Connor of Franklin, who is running independently this winter, concentrating on the Colgate Games where she won the 400 in 58,4 at the opening Dec. session.

Neptune has a pair of event leaders for the boys at this stage with Corey Nelms having run a 7.50 HH at the Christmas City Relays at Lehigh, while teammate Corey Wright clocked 49.55 for the 400 at the Seton Hall meet and 49.61 three days later at Lehigh.

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