Lyons and Moxley win state jumping crowns

June 5, 2010 at 12:09a.m.

By Joe Scalzo

columbus

With bad memories from last June still rolling around her head and a shaky performance in Friday’s preliminaries shifting her focus to the bottom of the medal stand rather than the top, Springfield senior Andria Lyons entered the Division III long jump finals with no expectations.

“I squeaked into the finals and I just wanted to make the podium and not let the person behind me beat me and put me in ninth,” said Lyons, who placed 13th in the event last year.

Maplewood junior high jumper Jordan Moxley was in a different situation. She, too, had jumped poorly at last year’s state meet but entered Friday’s competition as the clear favorite. Then she missed her first jump at 5-foot-2 — for Moxley, this was like missing a layup — and the doubts set in.

“I thought, ‘Oh my gosh, I’m going to have a horrible day, just like last year,’” said Moxley, who was sixth in 2009.

Then, with one jump, everything changed. For both girls.

Lyons nearly equaled her career-best with her first jump of the finals, soaring 16-11 to take the lead for good to capture the Tigers’ first state title since 2005 — and leave her stunned.

“Winning was ... I don’t ... I didn’t even ... It’s just amazing,” said Lyons, who found smiling to be a much easier task than talking. “I was not expecting it at all.”

Moxley also regrouped immediately, easily clearing 5-2 on her next attempt to help repair her confidence. She put plenty of doubts in her competitors’ heads over the next 30 minutes, clearing 5-5 and 5-6 on her first attempts before eventually clearing 5-7 to capture the title.

“I knew that with the state championship in Ohio, no matter what the division, 5-6 isn’t going to win it,” said Moxley, who matched the state high jump title won by Maplewood’s Jen Grayson in 2004, “You have to keep going. You have to keep fighting.”

As Lyons stood atop the podium, her younger cousin, Springfield sophomore Stephen Lyons, sat just a few feet away, awaiting his third place medal from the shot put. When he came off the stand, she smiled and punched him in the shoulder.

“I’m really happy for him,” she said. “Our entire family came here. We had people from Kentucky and back home.

“It was like a big family reunion.”

What did Stephen think?

“I’m proud of her,” he said. “Very proud, actually.”