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Warren JFK boys, McDonald girls both finish second at Fairless regional
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By Joe Scalzo
NAVARRE
Three years ago, McDonald won a boys state track title with two athletes.
This year, Warren JFK is trying to do it with four.
Carl and Chad Zallow each won a pair of individual titles at Friday’s Division III regional meet and the Eagles finished first in the 4x200 relay and second in the 4x400 relay to finish second in the team standings to Gilmour Academy, 85-70, at Fairless High School.
McDonald (631/3 points) was third and Maplewood (41 points) was fourth.
The Zallows, along with senior Zach Watt and freshman Jacob Coates, couldn’t match Gilmour’s depth, but the Eagles’ elite talent is best suited for June, not May.
“Points-wise, hopefully we can get up there,” Watt said of next week’s meet. “If we all do the best of our ability, I don’t see any reason why we can’t come out of there with a state title.”
Like he did at last year’s state meet, junior Chad Zallow won Friday’s 110 hurdles and the 300 hurdles (in a regional-record time of 37.62, nearly a second faster than the 38.49 run by Steubenville Catholic Central’s Zak Cernasky) and senior Carl Zallow won the 100 and 200.
Watt, who said he was at about 70 percent this weekend due to a groin injury, also placed fourth in the 400 on Friday to earn the final state qualifying spot.
“I’m just fighting the pain, fighting everything and getting through my races so I can worry about next week,” Watt said. “I’ve just got to rest this week and hopefully I’ll be all right next week.”
Senior Bobby Johnson, the Division III state cross country champion, won the 1600 and 3200 on Friday, setting a personal record in the mile (4:17.90). Johnson hadn’t planned to run both races until Wednesday, when his coach, Lou Domitrovich, said running both would give him more options down in Columbus.
“I think it turned out well,” Johnson said. “It was really tough to come back and run the two-mile. I told my teammates it was the hardest race I’ve run all year.”
Johnson’s teammate, junior Christian Smith, won the shot put to give him his second title of the weekend (he won the discus on Wednesday), Maplewood’s Solomon Yoder won the 800 and Mineral Ridge’s 4x100 team also placed first.
Of the 14 boys events on Friday, 10 were won by Trumbull County athletes.
Friday’s girls title came down to the final race, the 4x400 relay, with McDonald trailing St. Thomas Aquinas by one-third of a point. The Knights jumped out to a big lead entering the final lap but the Blue Devils’ anchor, Joya Humphries, nearly chased her down.
Aquinas finished about three seconds ahead in the 4x400 to capture the team title, 781/3 to 76.
“Yeah, we were watching,” McDonald girls coach Mary Domitrovich said of the final lap. “We knew it was a tough assignment all the way around. Aquinas is a phenomenal team and just to be in the same sentence with them, and to do what we do from a tiny, little village, I think that’s kind of cool.”
McDonald won the 4x100 and 4x200 relays and seniors Jai’Lynn Mosley and Tory Ross finished 1-2 in the discus for the Blue Devils, who won last week’s district team title.
“It’s tremendous,” Domitrovich said of the runner-up finish. “All of the kids in different areas contributed and all the coaches. This is a complete team victory and it’s kind of neat to see it all mesh together.”
JFK senior Morgan Rice, the reigning state 100 hurdle champion, won both hurdling events on Friday to help the Eagles place third with 46 points. Badger’s Jennilyn Krumpe won the long jump as the Braves took fifth with 35 points.