Grant Downes’ sweep of the hurdle events, a season-best for Enock Koudou and field event wins for Papay Glaywulu, Chris Nilsen and Alijah Gee led Park Hill to the Suburban Conference Red Division championship Tuesday, May 5 in Liberty, Mo. The meet was moved up two days to avoid inclement weather later in the week. In the final team standings, Park Hill ended up with 159 to easily top rival Park Hill South by 40 points for the boys title.
Downes won both the 110-meter hurdles (16.06 seconds) and 300 hurdles (42.45 seconds) to clip the Park Hill South duo of Grant Hudson and Clayton Hockensmith, who finished second and third. Koudou ran a 10.83 in the 100 to beat Ruskin’s Mike Nelson (10.92), while adding a third-place finish in the 200.
Gee went 6 feet, 2 inches in the high jump to best Nilsen, who scored another win in the pole vault with a 14-9 effort. Glaywulu, a sophomore, went 43-8 in the triple jump to beat second-place Seth Hudson of Park Hill South by more than 2 feet.
Hanok Tekle added to Park Hill’s balanced effort, finishing third in the 1,600 and second in the 3,200.
Park Hill South’s Darrien Case won the 1,600 for one of his four gold medals on the day, accounting for a big part of the Panthers’ five victories. He won the 800 by nearly 5 full seconds (1:57.32) and nearly duplicated that in the 1,600 with a 4:22.72 effort.
Case, Mitch Henderson, Tristan McCoy and Alexander Lee teamed to win the 4x800, while Case, Henderson, Tanner Alderson and Nylo Clark were the 4x400 champions. Park Hill finished second in both races.
Henderson also won the open 400 in 50.99, while Tanner McClaran (second in the discus) matched Hudson for Park Hill South’s best field finish.
On the girls side, Park Hill South finished second in the team standings behind champion Liberty. Park Hill came in third.
After flirting with the record all year, Amanda Tillman finally set the program mark in the pole vault with a height of 9-9. In addition, Lexi Maddox won the 3,200, and Janae Hammond won the 100 hurdles (16.49) for the Panthers other two victories. Maddox topped teammate Marti Height by a little more than 10 seconds in the 3,200.
Maddox teamed with Jasmine Crawford, Erin Stumpf and Emma Roth to win the 4x800, clocking 9:48.61 to beat Liberty by 4.01 seconds.
Roth came in second in the 1,600, beating Park Hill’s Mercedes Robinson for the runnerup spot behind St. Joseph Central’s Paityn Howat. Other runnerup finishes for Park Hill South included Jordan Hammond (400, 58.64), Janae Hammond (300 hurdles, 50.62; high jump 4-10), Maryn Burns (long jump, 16-10½) and the 4x100, 4x200 and 4x400 relays.
Park Hill didn’t have any individual champions, but Jillian Roepe took second in the 800, just ahead of Roth in third. Jasmine Chappell was second in the triple jump at 32-3¾ for the Trojans, just 1¾ inches in front of Park Hill South’s Sydney Stewart.
Taiya Shelby, a freshman, finished third, just behind Jordan Hammond, in the 400.
Suburban Conference Blue Division
Platte County ended up with three individual champions in a competitive field Tuesday, May 5 at Grandview High School in Grandview, Mo.
In the Pirates final meet ahead of the postseason, the girls came in third in the team standings with 90 points — just eight behind runner-up Kearney. Shelley Laures — a senior — won the high jump at 5-0, while Hillary Mathurin won the 300 hurdles in 49.15 to lead the way.
Platte County’s Melissa Ditter finished second to Laures in the high jump at 4-10.
The Pirates’ 4x800 team of Rebekah Geddes, Rachel Gilbert, Sara Wyss and Erin Straubel was second in the 4x800, finishing a little more than 15 seconds behind champion Kearney. Geddes also came in third in the 3,200, just in front of teammate Straubel.
Karleigh Wise grabbed the final medal for Platte County, tying for second in the pole vault at 7-6.
On the boys side, Platte County ended up fourth out of six with 75 points — behind Raytown South (135), Grandview (131) and Kearney (125). Mac Leet, a sophomore, won the lone individual title for the Pirates, clearing 6-0 in the high jump less than a week after setting his personal best at 6-4.
Nathan Straubel collected a pair of second-place medals, finishing behind Kearney standout Clayton Adams in both the 1,600 and 3,200. Aliek Reed came in third in the 300 hurdles in a personal best 39.61 seconds despite entering the event with little experience.
Reed also ran the anchor leg of the 4x400 behind Lloyd Lockett, Aaron Brown and David Fulk. The quartet finished in a season-best 3:30.23, less than ¾ of a second behind Grandview. Dane Rader rounded out the Pirates’ medalists with a third-place effort in the shot put (45-1).