By Michael Kinney
EDMOND, Okla. - With basketball season in its final days in Oklahoma, the Edmond Santa Fe Invitational was one of the last track meets to be held before all teams start to get their full complement of athletes. That includes teams such as Putnam City West and Edmond Santa Fe, who both had teams make deep runs into the state tournament.
Despite that, Patriots still had enough talent on the track to put on an impressive display Friday evening at ESF.
Putnam City West kicked off the meet by taking second in the 4x100 meter relay with a time of 42.84. They were just a split second behind Edmond North, who won the event with a 42.80.
However, the Patriots came back and took the 4x200 meter relay with a time of 1:30.39. That was enough to hold off Putnam City Original (1:30.56) and Mustang (1:30.64).
PCW's Jess Porter, who won the 100-meter dash state title last year, has shown no signs of slowing down. He ran a 10.91 to win the 100 and a 22.27 to post the top time in the 200-meter dash.
On the girl's side, it was all about defending champion Edmond Memorial.
The Lady Bulldogs owned the sprints and sprint relays. In the 4x100, they rolled to a time of 49.17. The Wolves were close behind at 49.67. Edmond North took third at 50. 20.
Memorial dominated in the 4x200. Their time of 1:43.53 was four seconds faster than runner-up Edmond North.
Edmond Memorial's Alysheia Joseph also a double winner in the 100 (12.51) and 200 (26.55) meter dashes.
Another double winner on the day was Mustang's Rachel Hamel. The defending 6A state champion in the 100-meter hurdles took the same event Friday with a time of 15.16. She then went out and won the 400-meter dash. With a time of 59.99 she was the only runner to cross the finish line under 1:01.
Hamel came close to winning a third gold as part of the 4x400 relay team. The Lady Broncos and Lady Bulldogs fought tooth and nail throughout the race. But it was Memorial who came away with a win with a time of 4:08.82. Mustang was a hair behind at 4:08.86.
Edmond North won the boy's overall team championship with 125 points. Putnam City West (75), Edmond Santa Fe (74), Mustang (71) and Yukon (67) rounded out the top five in the 11 team field.
Edmond Memorial took home the girls championship with 167 points. Edmond North was runner-up with 124 points. Owasso (83), ESF (68) and Mustang (61) were all battling for third.
