The last piece of the puzzle was the distance medley relay, which was slam dunked on Saturday by a beautiful piece of running by junior 1200 meter man Matt Bowen. His mighty 3:15.9 PR placed the Bucks among the "haves" in the hot heat. From there, juniors Joe Brill (54) and Andrew Baker (2:07) passed the stick to super sophomore Rock Fortna who ran a 4:35 1600 meter PR of his own and passed competitors to put West in 6th place. Their 10:54.26 puts them 14th in the state and was just five seconds shy of the automatic qualifying standard of 10:49.23.
In the beginning, there was the freshmen-sophomore 4x4, and it was good. Freshmen Mark McClenahan (65) and Lance Hofer (61, PR) teamed up with Logan Mazullo (63) and Drew Schoen (62) to post a 4:13.44. Senior Big Dan Nowakowski then continued his medal-streak in the 60 hurdles, earning 4th in a near PR of 9.04 seconds.
Junior Jacob Cawley had an outstanding race in the open 200 meters, running a personal best of 26.28 seconds, FAT (the good kind... fully automatically timed!). Sophomore Ryan Walsh also posted an indoor PR of 55.88 in the 400 meter dash. Classmate and BFF Ryan McIlhinney then threw down a 2:09.65 800 meter PR that was good enough to finish in the top half of the varsity field and to throw his hat into the 4x8 contender ring.
Junior Ian Davies placed 5th in a field of 29 milers to grab a medal for himself and earn his varsity letter for the season. His 4:47.92 was an all-time personal best. Sophomore distance standout Brian Iatarola is arriving at good form, evidenced by his 8th place and PR of 9:33.54 in the 3000 meter run.
The 4x800 meter relay followed with some gutsy performances of their own. Senior Ben Aunins led from the front by putting his stamp on the race with a breakout three second personal best in his 2:07 leadoff. Like Bowen's bravery, Aunin's aspiration set the tone for their teammates. Junior Beckett Wilson paced a solid 2:11, followed by big PRs from sophomores Declan McDonald (2:08.1) and Carter Zerweck (2:08.8). The Bucks took home bronze medals to show for their efforts and met the Meet of Champions qualifying standard with their amazing 8:36.24.
The 4x200 meter relay also ran inspired, with juniors Gillis Wang, Ryan Devlin, and Evan Henrick, joining with freshman John Smith, and combining for a 13th place 1:40.74, less than a second away from the Bucks' season-best. Wang posted the fastest split with a 25.0 leadoff, followed by inseparable 25.1 and 25.2 PRs by all.
Junior Josh Bazzano is still looking for his game-ball after ANOTHER outstanding season debut. This week, Bazzano took to the friendly skies on a pole for the first time in eight months and cleared an indoor PR of 11-6, earning a silver medal and a spot in the event at the Meet of Champions. Bazzano even put a good look at 12 feet before paraphrasing from Allen Iverson's unforgettable "...we talkin' 'bout practice!?!".
The competition ended on a high note with freshman Teagan Fortna posting a sweet PR of 57.4 in the 4x400 meter relay.
The Bucks return to action against the best in the eastern half of Pennsylvania at the PTFCA Carnival at 9:00 on Saturday at Lehigh. Check out accepted entries (alpha order) and order of events.