Dan Eyrich, AP Sports
The EP Panther track teams celebrated senior night as they hosted the Ed Schmidt Invitational in Erie on Friday night. Five girls squads and four boys squads competed in the event with the EP boys racking up 89 points, 11 better than Morrison to take first and Kewanee Wethersfield generating 106 points on the girls side to take the title over the Lady Panthers with 77.
The Panthers won all three distance events including the 4 x 800m Relay and four out of the six field events on their way to the title.
Senior Charles Link won the 800m and 1600m runs with season best times of 2:04 and 4:46. Tyson Skinner took top honors in 3200m in 10:52. EP’s 4 x 800m Relay with Link, Lucas Dreisbach, Wyatt Beck, and Gus Schultz took first in 8:57.
In the field events, horizontal jumper Caleb Eads won the long jump with an effort of 6.18m and the triple jump with a leap of 12.29m. Joe Papineau won the discus with a PR toss of 34.73m with Caleb Reymer taking runner-up in the shot put with a heave of 11.17m. Aiden Jepson and Nathan Punke took first and second in the pole vault each clearing 3.51 m, a PR for Punke.
Lady Panthers Second
The Lady Panthers dominated the field events on their side of the meet winning five of the six events. Kennedy Buck continues to improve in the shot ring throwing another PR. Her toss of 11.32 m was good for first with freshman Navonna Lopez also tossing a PR effort with a throw of 9.60m for second. Claire Reymer obliterated her PR in the discus winning the event with a toss of 36m. Olivia Purvis and Gracelyn Abell went one-two in the pole vault each clearing 2.74 m, a PR for Abell. Ellie Johnson won the long jump with a 4.46m effort and freshman Lauren Punke won the triple jump in PR fashion traveling 9.34 m.
On the track, Savannah Wuebben won the 400m with a PR of 1:14. In the distance events Clara Ashdown took second in the 800m with a PR time of 2:52 with freshman Jessie DeNeve winning the 1600m with a PR of just under six minutes.
The 4 x 100m relay of Ellie Johnson, Saige Froeliger, Alexus Kappel and Kennedy Buck took second with a time of 54.35. The 4 x 200m Relay also took second with Johnson, Kappel, Buck, and Lauren Punke finishing in 1:56. The 4 x 800m Relay squad of Jillian Norman, Clara Ashdown, Brooke Lalley, and Sarah Link took second in a time of 11:40.
The next event on the calendar is the Sailer Invitational at Augustana College on Tuesday.
