Red Arrows Finish 4th in the RCA Conference Meet with Another Close One
Coaches Article
Paul Judd
Two of the three Red Arrow losses were by a combined total of less than twenty points. As mentioned often that is a matter of a couple first or second place finishes being switched. The outcome of the RCA conference meet looked very familiar as the Arrows finished in forth place with 110 points which was eleven off of 2nd and seven off of 3rd.
The first day was good for Lowell as they got on the bus with a conference champion in the 3200m relay as the team of Cooper Byrne, Tyler Bromley, Cody Bromley, and Marshall Huhn ran away from the field to win in 8:09.07 which is the #2 time on the LHS record board. The race was close until Cody Bromley made a significant move right before the 400m mark to create some space between the Arrows and Allendale.
Good things continued to happen in the prelims as Ian Kuntz reached the finals in the 100m and was joined by teammate Jacob Ort in the 200m finals. In the field events Lowell was scoring all over with the highlight coming in the long jump where three Arrows jumped over 19’ with both Ethan Berg and Caleb Kooiman making the finals.
In the finals Kooiman popped a 19-09.50 which was another PR on the day and moved him into sixth place. Kooiman had a great day as he had three PR jumps with many in the 19’6” area, Ethan scratched on his second to last jump which looked to be above 21’ but came back on the last jump to land a PR 20-06 jump which moved him to 3rd place and #10 on the LHS record board.
In the Pole Vault Lyle O’Boyle was going back-to-back with a Cedar Springs jumper and ended in 3rd place with a vault of 11-06. Wiley Garrelts completed his third week of high jump by finishing 3rd at the conference meet with a jump of 5-06.
On the west end of the field the throwers were also getting it done as Tommy Benedict and Brady Smith took 4th and 5th in the shot put with throws of 43-00 (PR) and 42-10 (season best). Smith would come back in the discus to grab 5th place with a toss of 132-03 and would end day one with eight all conference points.
Day two was a day of ups and downs. Kuntz snagged an 8th place in the 100m as he went 11.62. The injury bug hit the 800m relay again as the team of Kuntz, Smith, Ort, and Kooiman had its night ended early due to a pulled hamstring. The injury to Ort was costly as he leads the team on and off the track and was scheduled to race two more times where points would be gathered for AC consideration.
Marshall Huhn continued his RCA dominance as he won both the 1600m and the 800m with times of 4:21.80 and 2:00.70 (PR). Huhn would come back to place 4th in the 3200m and would end the meet with 27.5 points which was the highest of all RCA athletes.
Lowell had three other medalists in the 1600m as Byrne finished 5th (4:30.19 PR #2LHS), Avi Elabed finished 6th (4:30.78 PR #3 LHS), and Cody Bromley finished 7th in a PR 4:35.59.
In the 800m Tyler Bromley nailed a 3rd place finish with a 2:04.43 v(PR) and Kingston Reman finished 7th in 2:08.51 (PR). The distance crew closed their evening with four medalists, Cooper Byrne maintained the pace and ended with a 3rd place time of 9:43.49.
In addition, Byrne and Huhn the Red Arrows had two more medalists as Elabed finished 6th and Cody Bromley finished 7th with times of 10:06.22 and 10:06.42. The sprints had two additional medalists as Kuntz would snag a 4th in the 200m and Braam Maatman would grab 5th place medal in the 400m going 42.96 (PR).
Marshall Huhn earned RCA All-Conference honors by winning two events and being a member of the 3200m relay team where he was joined by the Bromley brothers and Cooper Byrne. The guys competed great over the two days and continued to compete even after the 800m relay. The Red Arrows stayed focused, and the performances showed it with 17 personal bests on the day as well as two relays that set season best times.
Lowell’s JV members will try to get one more good mark as they will go to Kenowa Hills on Tuesday for the JV Conference meet.
Lowell’s varsity members will be at Portage Central on Saturday for the MHSAA regional meet.
Team Scores
Coopersville – 136
Cedar Springs – 121
Allendale – 116.5
Lowell – 110
Greenville – 86.5
GR Kenowa Hills – 52
Sparta – 34
