Twice as nice Barnett repeats as IESA state champ

Bureau County has a repeat state champion.

Bureau Valley South eighth-grader Saige Barnett won the IESA 1A state shot put championship for the second straight year with a throw of 35 feet, 9 1/4 inches. She is the first repeat state champion in school history since Preston Jones won the 400 meters in 2000 and 2001.

Barnett, who also qualified in the discus, is one of six BVS athletes to have won an IESA state championship.

BVS’ Nate Paup just missed out on two medals, placing ninth in the 400 (56.02) and 10th in the high jump (5-5).

BV North brought home two medals from state. The Storm’s 4x200 relay of brothers Wyatt and Cael Davis, James Macklin and Mac Nugent came in as state runners-up with a time of 1:50.83.

Wyatt Davis also placed third in the high jump (5-5).

The BVN eighth-grade 4x200 relay of Andrew Mazzei, Payton Moore, Ian Pistole and Eric Schoff was one spot from the medal stand with a ninth-place finish (1:44.56).

Lydia Mead of Princeton St. Louis picked up a fourth-place medal in the eighth-grade 400 (1:02.25).

Bureau County landed two medals in the seventh-grade 100 with sixth-place Marshall Walk of Ladd (12.89) and seventh-place Justin Mitchell of DePue (12.88).

LaMoille Allen boasted two medalist with seventh-grader Tobi Walzer placing seventh in shot put (29-0) and Thomas Stamberger getting sixth in the 800 meters (2:12.37).

• 2A state: Princeton Logan seventh-grader Nathan Wright qualified for this weekend's IESA 2A State Meet, placing fourth in Saturday's Geneseo Sectional in the shot put. He had a qualifying throw of 34-4 1/2, which was a personal best.

Non-qualifying place-finishers for Logan include eighth-graders Abigail Scaggs, second in the 200 (29.01) and Shaela Hayes, fifth in long jump (14-6), and seventh-graders Christian Kinnamon, Ethan Wright, Matthew Cihocki and Ian Sampson, third in the 4x200 relay (1:53.28), Cole Adams, Kinnamon, Sampson and Brandon Haring, fifth in the 4x400 (4:46.17), and Ethan Wright, sixth in the 400 (1:05.58).

• SRC Meet: Logan's 4x200 relay of Kinnamon, Ethan Wright, Cihocki and Sampson also won last week's Starved Rock Conference crown. Hayes won the eighth-grade girls long jump title with a jump of 13-6.

Logan’s top team showing was a third for the eighth-grade girls.

• Notes: Other past state champions for BVS are Madison Lebahn (2002 8A shot and discus), Michael Grieve (2002 8A 1600), Melanie Thompson (2005 7A discus) and Regan Weidner (2011 8A, 1600).

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