Track Team Wins Hotly-Contested State Meet

Nick Weindel, Jay Journal Staff

The two-day state track and field tournament, held at Burke Stadium, was a competitive one: it was not decided until the final event. When the dust settled on Saturday, May 20, it was Creighton Prep who came out on top.

Trailing Grand Island by 2.5 points heading into the final event, the 4×400, Will Krolikowski, John Carlisle, Noah Strako and Ryan Eastman put together a performance good for fifth place. Grand Island did not score in the event, catapulting the team to a 2017 state title, its second in three years.

Prep sent 15 competitors to the state meet, and all of them medaled. This strong all-around performance was a major boost for the team, allowing them to take home the hardware when it was all said and done.

The 4×800 squad of Luke Dickas, Daniel Mattern, Colin Keller and Ryan Eastman won first place, as did the 4×100 team of Nate Lorenz, Shannon Brewer, Noah Velinsky and Marcus Vaughn-Jones. Lorenz, Brewer, Velinsky and Vaugh-Jones left the competition in the dust, coming within 0.2 seconds of the school record in the event.

The team’s victory at state was unexpected, but they certainly had the potential to perform as well as they did, as coach Dan Tietjen said to the track and field athletes, “I know we’re a top five team. Where we go from there is up to you guys.”

Where they went was another championship for the program