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Smiths enjoy State success
WICHITA -- When you're given a golden opportunity, you should take advantage of it without regret.
Uniontown senior Kaity Smith did just that Saturday morning when she won the Class 2A girls' 100-meter hurdles final at the Kansas State Track and Field Championships here.
Smith won the race in 16.52 seconds, taking the lead at the start and never looking back as she beat Leoti's Kyla Bishop by .21 seconds.
The race generated some irony as Smith recalled that Sublette sophomore Sumr Robinett, who had the best preliminary time Friday by 1/10th of a second, was talking as if the title was hers and everyone else was fighting for second.
But then Robinett committed a false start. And these days in track, there is no second chance when one does so. She was out of the race and now it was anyone's to win.
"I thought 'I really had a chance now,'" Smith recalled. "I was kind of worried about the girl in lane five (Dana Loganbill of Moundridge) but I was pretty confident after (the false start)."
Loganbill had posted the second-best time in preliminaries with Smith third and Bishop fourth.
With lane four now vacant, Loganbill took the lead over the first hurdle. But Smith and Bishop were right there with her. Loganbill couldn't keep up the pace -- she finished sixth -- and the race became a battle between Smith and Bishop.
"Maybe about the eighth hurdle," was when Smith said she felt like she had control of the race. "I felt like I had a good start but at the eighth hurdle was when I felt like I was pulling ahead. That's when I felt really confident."
It was a good day for the Smith family as sister Abbie, a freshman, took second in the long jump competition. Their father, Tracy, had an up-close look at that one as he was serving as a judge for the event.
Paige Carswell, a senior from Pratt-Skyline, recorded her winning jump of 16 feet, 4 3/4 inches on her first jump in preliminaries and matched it on her second jump of finals. Smith fouled on three of her first four jumps, but it was the second one on which she recorded her 16' 4 1/2" effort that held up as the second-place mark.
Katie Brevitz, a senior from Valley Falls, finished third, going 16' 2 1/4" on her third jump in the preliminaries.
Uniontown's boys carried over their Friday success -- when they won three medals -- picking up four more medals.
The 4x100-meter relay team of George Pillion, Zach Mason, Brandon Boyd and Gage McKinnis finished second in the finals in 44.22 seconds. Minneapolis won the event in 43.52.
McKinnis won two more individual events. He finished fifth in the finals of the 100-meter dash after qualifying sixth earlier in the morning.
McKinnis' preliminary time was 11.38 seconds. Kenton Lonberger of Minneapolis had the only sub-11-second time in the prelims as he won the second heat in 10.97 seconds.
Lonberger's form held up in the finals as he won in 10.99 with brother Kyle taking second in 11.49. McKinnis recorded a time of 11.62 in taking fifth, just 1/10th of a second out of fourth (Jordan Wyatt of Washington County) and a half-second from third (Logan Hall of Skyline).
McKinnis added a seventh-place medal to his take when he ran the 300-meter hurdles final in 42.09. Lawson Montgomery of Bennington was the winner in 40.51.
Boyd, who had already won two medals Friday as he took third in the boys' long jump and tied for fifth in high jump, added a sixth-place medal for his 23.37 time in the 200-meter finals. The elder Lonberger was the winner in 22.07.
In other Saturday events, Katie Spainhoward finished 11th in girls' shot put with a mark of 32' 2 1/4". Heidi Smith of Elkhart won the event by nearly two feet with a throw of 41' 2".
In boys' discus, Dominick Robinson, who placed third in shot put Friday, had to settle for 12th place with a mark of 129' 2". Teammate Heath Clayton was 16th at 104' 5".
Team scoring saw Uniontown's boys tie for fifth with Washington County High School with 28 1/2 points each. Minneapolis won its third straight State title -- it won 3A in 2005 and 2A last year -- with 65 points, just getting by Ellis, which had 64.
Eagle girls finished with 18 points, which tied for 11th with Lyndon. Osborne scored 56 points to win its first State title since 2002 and its fifth overall. Plainville was second with 46 points.