Canyon High School track and field coach George Velarde said Thursday’s Foothill League team championship held at College of the Canyons was about meeting expectations.
Both the boys and the girls took the Foothill League titles for the third consecutive season, a testament to their hard work, Velarde said.
“We’re so proud of them, very proud of our coaching staff to bring all the kids together. I mean, look at this,” Velarde said while pointing to a group of Canyon athletes taking a picture to commemorate the moment. “It’s just awesome, you know, and very rewarding seeing the kids continuing to improve. That’s the key.”
The Canyon girls collected 170 points, nearly 60 more than second-place Golden Valley. They won eight of the 16 events and had two girls, Lanai Gant and Alessandra Pratti, win two events individually.
Gant won the 100-meter and 200-meter races, while Pratti won in the 100-meter hurdles and the 300-meter hurdles.
Also picking up individual wins were Emoni Wright in the 100 and Elena Cox in the pole vault.
Gant was also victorious as part of the 4×100 relay team that also included Wright, Lyric Scott and Alaya Graves-Hogains. Gant, Graves-Hogains and Scott finished first through third, respectively, in the 200, while Wright took fifth.
The 4×400 relay team from Canyon was also victorious.
On the boys’ side, Canyon picked up 139 points to take the team title, 51 more than second-place Castaic.
Jordehn Gammage, last year’s state champion in the 300-meter hurdles, was dominant in that race en route to a win. He also took first in the 110-meter hurdles.
Myles McCrory won the 400, and Owen Souther won in the 3200 and took second in the 1600.
Souther was just behind Hart’s Alejandro Cueto until the final stretch, eventually beating Cueto by a little more than two seconds.
Nathan Hernandez took first place in the pole vault. His mark of 15 feet was 3 feet higher than Golden Valley’s Keagan Lee and Castaic’s Ramon Espinoza in second place.
The 4×400 relay team also took first place.
“Good, old-fashioned hard work,” Velarde said. “There is no other secret.”
Thursday marked the first time that the Foothill League has had a one-day meet to determine the league champions. Previously, champions were determined based on scores collected from dual meets throughout the season.
“It was good competition from all the teams,” Velarde said. “Do we need to make some improvements and make some changes? Sure. I’m sure after the season’s over, we as coaches, we’ll come together and see how we can make this better.”
The point totals for the girls’ teams are as follows:
- Canyon: 170.
- Golden Valley: 112.
- Saugus: 104.
- Valencia: 42.
- West Ranch: 31.
- Hart: 18.
- Castaic: 15.
The point totals for the boys’ teams are as follows:
- Canyon: 139.
- Castaic: 88.
- West Ranch: 63.
- Valencia: 58.
- Golden Valley: 58.
- Saugus: 49.
- Hart: 40.
Athletes from across the Foothill League are set to meet at COC again on Friday for individual preliminaries. League finals are set for Thursday, May 31, at COC to determine who will advance to the CIF preliminaries on Saturday, May 10.
A few other standouts from the other Foothill League teams showed that they will be names to watch for in the coming weeks.
The Golden Valley Grizzlies saw senior Kiera Donovan, the two-time reigning CIF champion in girls’ discus, take first in that event. She was also first in the shot put after taking fourth at CIF in that event last year.
Golden Valley’s Nyah Fields was first in the girls’ long jump and triple jump while taking second in the 100, while Addae Ma’at won both the boys’ long jump and the triple jump. Teammates Josh Farley and Riley Bellamy were third and fourth in the triple jump, respectively, while Farley was fourth in the long jump and RJ Yoakum and Kamal Molake were tied for fifth in that event.
The Saugus Centurions were victorious in a number of distance events. Henry Saywell was first in the 800, as was Adrian Cantu in the 1600.
In the girls’ 3200, Saugus had the first four finishers in Lucia Pearson, Mikaila Whitman, Sydney Kasahara and Amanda Yanez.
Valencia had its boys’ 4×100 team place first. Caysen Badawi claimed the boys’ 200 and was second in the 100, while Elise Henderson was first in the girls’ high jump.
West Ranch saw Jayden Brown take first in the boys’ high jump and Aidan Lynch was third in both the boys’ 110-meter hurdles and 300-meter hurdles.
Annabelle Amneus was second in the girls’ discus and third in the shot put for West Ranch.
Castaic’s Nikita Berezkin was first in the boys’ discus, beating out Canyon’s Norayr Mihranyan by just 8 inches. Elijah Reid claimed the boys’ 100 and was third in the 200.
Hart’s Graysen Rivera was first in the boys’ shot put.
