ANN ARBOR — While nursing a slight lead midway through the meet, Ann Arbor Greenhills coach Jarrett Bussell was concerned that his team might be overtaken by University-Liggett in the sprint events.
Bussell’s fears turned out to be unfounded, as the Gryphons turned up the heat in the longer races and cruised to the Catholic High School League’s St. Anne Division track team title.
“For the boys, we knew we had to lean on our distance cleaning up a lot of points — just getting people scoring, giving a lot of them full days, a lot of mileage underneath their feet,” he said.
Greenhills’ dominance in the distance events was the main factor in the Gryphons’ overwhelming win.
Greenhills won the 4x800 relay, placed 1-2-3-6-7-8 in the mile, took the top four spots in the 800, and added 1st-2nd-4th-5th-6th places in the 3200. Sophomore Naveen Kulkarni won the 1600 and 3200 (4:54.70 and 10:40.40) and placed second in the 800.
“We ran as a pack; we tried to conserve our energy in the mile because a lot of us had the 400, 800 or 3200 after that,” senior captain Mason Stranahan said. “Even some of us who could have gone in the 4:40s if we tried, had we really gone for it, we tried to use as little energy as we could to score as many points as we possibly could.
“In a championship meet, it’s all about places and points — time is not a factor to us at all.”
“I think our distance runners really locked in. They got probably a good 100 points from just the mile, the two-mile and the 800. That got us a ton of points,” senior Ishan Leahy said. “Also, the sprinters did a good job just taking some points away from Liggett and Shrine, or just placing at least.”
Running on their home track May 20, Greenhills piled up 199 points to lead the 10-team field — 93½ better than University-Liggett. Shrine (87), Allen Park Cabrini (82) and Marine City Cardinal Mooney (38) filled out the top five.
Greenhills participants were regularly listed among the top eight of every event, and its team score was suitably inflated because of additional qualifiers competing in several races.
“Entry-wise, we really kind of gamed it,” Stranahan said. “We had a lot of people running a lot of events. We had distance runners in sprinting events. The distance runners trained really hard. I’m really proud of their character. They showed a lot of dedication.”
“I would say there was a lot of emphasis on who was put where (in the lineup), and that really helped, because some of the teams like Shrine and Liggett have one person who’s insanely good,” Leahy added, “but overall, I think our team was just better.”
Two seasons ago, Greenhills had tied for the team title with Riverview Gabriel Richard, and finished second behind Liggett last year, so that weighed heavily on the Gryphons’ approach this spring.
“We put a lot of focus on this meet all year,” Stranahan said. “This was what most of us were looking to. Anybody who isn’t qualified for states, this is ‘our meet’ that we were planning on targeting all season. Catholic League champions is our biggest goal as a team.”
“We go pretty hard during the training during the beginning and the middle of the season. Once we get down to regionals, which was a few days ago, we start to taper off with the training, lower the weights and do a bit less so we can be in prime condition with our muscles for this last meet,” senior captain Nico Dettling said.
Shrine’s Abenezer Cerone was a double event-winner, taking the 400 and 200 dashes (50.30 and 23.01). The versatile junior won the 1600 and 800 at this meet last season.
Greenhills’ girls matched the boys’ success, successfully defending their team title. The Gryphons totaled 163 points, ahead of Liggett (142), Cabrini (94), Shrine (57) and Clarkston Everest Collegiate (51).
“We knew the girls squad was going to be really strong, especially in the field events,” Bussell said. “They cleaned up with a lot of points there, and we knew that we could hang around with Liggett in some of the running events; we knew we’d be chasing them in other spots on the girls’ side.”
“I think that we have so many talented runners — especially these newcomers this year — our underclassman squad is really, really strong” said senior Eleana Zhuang, who anchored Greenhills’ winning 4x200 and 4x400 relay squads (1:52.81, 4:24.76). “Also I think our whole squad team dynamic is super-strong, and we’re all so supportive of each other. We always try to push each other every single day at practice, as well.”
Senior Lauren Sheffield contributed 32 points to the Greenhills output by winning the shot put and discus, and placing third in both hurdle races.
“Our team did really well today. I’m really proud of my throws squad,” she said. “I got a (personal record) in the shot put (33’ 6¾”); that was really great to happen on a day like this, being wet and all. In discus I was about 20 feet shorter than my best, but with a shoulder injury and the weather, I’ll take it. I also put up some decent times in the hurdles.”
University-Liggett freshman Phalyn Walker won the 100 and 200 dashes (13.20 and 26.81) and ran on Liggett’s winning 4x100 relay (52.28).
