Lady Wave track takes first, boys come in 4th at Yerington

With the first large meet of the season on the horizon, the Greenwave track and field teams faced strong competition in the Yerington Relays on Saturday.

The Lady Wave improved from last week’s second-place finish to win Saturday’s event with 111 points, followed by Sierra Lutheran with 98 and Fernley with 95.5. Dayton finished fourth with 94 points and Smith Valley had 69 to round out the top five.

“It was a great team win for us. All of the girls contributed,” Fallon girls coach Paul Orong said.

Fallon struck gold in the field with Leann Stands dominating the throwing events, and Whitney Skabelund commanding the jumps.

Stands won both the shot put and discus with throws of 34-6 and 99-6 feet, while Skabelund won the long jump at 15-11.50 and triple jump at 32-8.50.

Misaki Claire finished sixth in both the shot put and discus at 28-4.50 and 88, and Lillie Wohle was seventh in the shot put at 26-8.75 and Gracy Lisanti was ninth in the discus at 79-2.

Fallon placed five in the top 10 of the triple jump as Clare finished third (31-5.25), Brynlee Shults followed in fourth (31-3), Sierra Hickox was sixth (29-8.25) and Emily Evett finished ninth (28-11.25). Shults took fourth in the long jump at 14-1.50 and Hickox was sixth at 13-5.

Allie Lister and Skabelund each tied for sixth in the pole vault at 7 feet, while Caitlin Knox was ninth at 6-6.

In the running events, Chloe Overlie finished fifth in the 1600-meter run in 6 minutes, 1.39 seconds, and finished sixth in the 800 in 2:43.29. Mayla Dahl took seventh in the 400 in 1:10.66 and Melanie Nuckolls was eighth in the 1600 in 6:12.85.

Shelby Hickox took eighth in the 100 hurdles in 19.88 and 11th in the 300 hurdles in 58.68, followed by Elizabeth Ebner in 12th in 59.65. Amanda Pursley took 11th in the 3200 in 15:31.89.

Fallon won the 4x400 relay in 4:36.06, while it took third in the 4x200 in 1:56.50 and fourth in the 4x800 in 11:41.34. Fallon finished sixth in the 4x100 relay in 56.03.

On the boys side, Sparks bested Yerington for first with 122 points to the host’s 109. Dayton took third with 92 points followed by Fallon with 76.5 and Fernley with 72.

“Considering how young we are, I thought that was an impressive finish,” Fallon boys coach Steve Heck said. “We had a lot of great performances from our young group. Many of them did not break into the top eight to get points, but they were improving each meet. I am really happy with where we are right now. We have a long season ahead, but the kids working hard and it shows in their performances.”

Heck was pleased with performances from the underclassmen and newcomers, including freshman Colton Peterson and newcomers Cade Vercelotti and Conner Nelson.

Peterson took fourth in the 200 with a 24.27 sprint and finished eighth in the 100 with a 12.13. Broder Thurston came in sixth in the 400 with a 55.73 while Isaiah Williams was the team’s top finisher in the 800 as he came in 13th in 2:21.75. Williams also took 14th in the 1600 in 5:22.25.

Tristen Thomson, who didn’t run the 800 or 1600, took first in the 3200 in 10:05.90, followed by teammate Mario Ugalde in second in 11:01.41. Joseph Terry took eighth with a 11:19.78 time.

“We thought this would be a good chance to give him a break from the 800 and 1600,” Heck said of Thomson. “He was extremely impressive out distancing the field by almost a full minute.

“This was (Ugalde’s) first meet of the year and he did not disappoint running a strong second to Tristen. He held off a late surge by several competitors to clinch the second place spot.”

Trevor Brown finished 10th in the 110 hurdles in 20.08 followed by Reid Clyburn in 11th in 20.26. Clyburn, though, took fourth in the 300 hurdles in 46.31.

In the field events, TJ Mauga took second in the shot put with a throw of 48-01.25 and third in the discus at 145-04. Vercelotti netted a top-10 finish in the shot put but found success in the high jump as he finished sixth at 5-8. Byran Duenas finished sixth in the long jump (18-5) and ninth in the triple jump (36-6), while Nelson was seventh in the long at 18-2.5. Nathaniel Klein finished seventh in the pole vault at 9-6.

The 4x100 and 4x800 relay teams finished third in 47.04 and 9:04.40, while the 4x400 team took fourth in 3:44.11 and the 4x200 team was sixth in 1:42.55. The 4x100 team included Clyburn, Peterson, Nelson and Vercelotti, while the 4x200 team included Clayton Steelmon, Dustin Hopkins, Shane Ussery and Drake Copley. Thurston, Peterson, Thomson and Ugalde ran the 4x400, and Joseph Terry, Ugalde, Thomson and Kapili Gleason were on the 4x800 team.

Fallon returns to action on Friday for the freshmen/sophomore meet at McQueen before hosting the Elks Invitational on Saturday. Heck said that almost all of Northern Nevada will be competing in Fallon on Saturday. Heck is excited for Saturday’s opportunity competing against schools from all four classes.

“This weekend will be a real test for the team,” Heck said. “The competition will be tremendous. If a kid can place or medal at this meet it will be big accomplishment. I hope we can get a crowd to come out and watch.”