Menu
Despite disruptions, McCook boys still finish in 'B' top five
OMAHA, Neb. — Despite all sorts of painful adversity, the McCook Bison boys still placed No. 5 among nearly 60 teams competing at Class B state track and field last weekend.
The Bison scored 30 team points which finished behind only runaway champion Waverly’s 75, Blair’s 47, Elkhorn North with 43 and Platteview’s 36.
McCook achieved all this despite losing top sprinters Weston Walgren and Jacob Gomez-Wilson to hamstring injuries at the Southwest Conference meet three weeks earlier.
They also missed qualifying a 400-memter relay by one second.
On Thursday, they had to adjust their 1600-meter relay after sophomore 800-meter qualifier Josiah Wilkinson became ill to finish that race.
However, coach Tom Sughroue provides better insights about the Bison’s latest effort at Burke Stadium.
“Every year it is our goal to be a top 10 team at the end of the season. This year was no different. We had high hopes of finishing in the top 10.
Really we thought we could finish very high in the team standings. That just wasn’t to be. We had to many injuries to key pieces of the puzzle this spring. With Jacob Gomez-Wilson, Weston Walgren suffering injuries at the SWC just didn’t leave them enough time to recover for the district meet.
These two were involved in many events and without them we took a huge blow to our ability to compete in some events at the state meet. We had a few others that suffered injuries throughout the season as well. We were still able to come out with a District 6 Title, not a small feat. But this group was looking for more.
Going into the state meet we knew Waverly had a strong team and that proved to be the point as they were
the state champions. Our strongest points going into the state meet were our jumps. Adam Dugger, Brett Fraker and Alex Messinger in the triple jump.
Adam, Evan Mai and Brett the long jump.
We scored most of or team point in those two events. (Senior) Lucas Gomez-Wilson had a very successful state meet placing in both the 100 and 200 meters. He had a stellar season!
Scoring points at the state meet isn’t an easy thing to do. Think about it. There are 60 class B schools. Of those 60 school you have the potential of having 180 varsity athletes competing in each event. Only 24 of those qualify for the state meet and to medal you have to be in the top 8 of that group.
That puts you in a pretty elite group.
You just never know how things will go. We were hopeful that we might score a few more points. We had Josiah in the 800, Hayden Norgaard in the pole vault, Osney Barber in both hurdle events and we had our 4x400 meter relay with Josiah, Patrick Gross , Alex and Lucas.
Josiah had a heat related issue during the 800 and was unable to compete in the 4x400 meter relay. Adam stepped up and ran that spot for us.
We may not have scored as may points as we had hoped we still finished in the top 5 of the 60 class B schools.
Anytime you can walk away from the state meet with a top 10 team finish let alone a top 5 finish it has been a successful meet.”