Best showing ever for Hawks at girls start track meet

CHARLESTON – With state places in four events and 22 points, the Oregon girls track & field team had its best showing ever at the IHSA 1A state meet.

The Hawks were 11th in team standings. El Paso-Gridly won the meet with 56.

Leading the way was freshman Jillian Hammer, who placed third in the 100-meters hurdles and fifth in the 300 hurdles. Senior Grace Tremble added a fifth in the 400 meters and junior Skylar Bishop a fifth in the high jump.

Competing against Lia Patterson of Tuscola, who ended here career with 16 state medals and seven championships, Hammer ran personal bests of 15.17 in the 100 hurdles and 44.46 in the 300s. Patterson won both with times of 14.39 and 43.16.

The 15.15 was only .02 off Cydney Long’s 2014 school record, also set at the state meet. Ironically, Long lost to the eventual 1A record holder Jenny Kimbro of Catlin Salt Fork, whose record (13.97) Patterson was unable to reach.

Kimbro also holds the 300 record at 42.51, a mark that Hammer has three more years to shoot for, along with attempting to claim a first-ever title on the track for the Hawks.

Shot putters Brenna Noon (2021) and Jenae Bothe (2022) and pole vaulter Ashley Harvey (2004) won in the field events.

In both the prelims and finals, Tremble came from behind on the final straightaway to qualify and then run a personal best (57.68) by two seconds to take fifth.

In a day of PRs for the Hawks, Bishop leaped 5-foot-2 ¼ to beat out four other competitors for fifth place. All made the same height, but Bishop came out ahead by making it on her first attempt.

Forreston’s Bree Schneiderman. a sophomore, ended a stellar season with sixth place in the 100 (12.34) and fifth in the 200 (25.61).

In both races, Emma Randecker of West Carroll set new 1A meet records at 11.91 and 24.49. She also won the 400 in 55.78.

In the preliminaries, Oregon had a couple of close calls, with the 1,600 relay of Lorelai Danhorn, Taylor Weems, Bishop, and Tremble finishing 11th with a 4:14.18 clocking. They needed a time better than 4:12.21 to grab the ninth and final state finals spot.

Sonya Plescia, who had a 10-foot clearance as a sophomore in the 2023 preliminaries to make the finals in the pole vault, had on off day and settled for an 8-6 vault in the prelims, only six inches short of moving on to the finals. In the finals, 9-0 would have earned a medal.

Discus thrower Alease McLain, who came into the state meet with a seed of 113-4, finished her career at Oregon with a 97-6. Tremble leaped 4-11 in the HJ prelims.

2A MEET

It was state medals for senior Neve Schilling and junior Malia Morton of Byron at the IHSA 2A track meet. Rochelle’s Erin Murphy also picked up a medal, with a third place in the shot put.

Schilling high jumped 5-2 ¼ and finished in a fourth place logjam. Six competitors made that height, but Schilling and Jacqueline Dill of Pinckneyville made it on their first attempts to tie for fourth, while others were relegated from sixth to ninth place.

The winning height was 5-7 by Katie Kostro of Aurora Rosary. It was also a huge logjam in the prelims as 24 jumpers moved on to the finals with a 5-1 clearance, with standard number usually around 12 finalists.

Morton took ninth place in the 100 hurdles with a time of 15.67. The winning time was 13.99. In the prelims, she needed a 15.38 to make the finals.

The Tigers also had a strong showing in the 1600 relay, with Schilling, Macyn Burris, Ashley Potter and Skylar Palmgren combining for a 4:10. That was 14th out of 39 teams, but short of the 4:06 needed to make the finals.

In the 800 relay prelims, Palmgren, Potter, Schilling and Morton ran 1:48.24, good for 29th.

Stillman was also represented in the 2A preliminaries in several events.

In the 400 meters, Alexandria Hoff ran 1:01.90. In the 100 hurdles, Dionyesia Cantu-Ramos had a PR of 16.39, after joining an unusually high total of eight hurdlers to qualify out of the Sterling sectional.

The 400 relay of Taylor Davidson, Saundra Broderson, Makinzie Lamb and Hoff clocked a 51.35. The same four girls had a 4:17 in the 1600 prelims.

Broderson’s 4-11 in the high jump was 2 inches from the mark needed to make the finals. Lamb ran 48.01 in the 300 hurdles.