Springs Valley Community High School

The Springs Valley track and field team was looking for a challenge. On Saturday, it got one. The Blackhawks traveled to Ellettsville to compete in the Mustang Invitational and when they arrived they were about six miles away from their regional venue, Bloomington North, but there was absolutely a regional atmosphere. Springs Valley’s boys rose to the challenge, placing fourth out of nine teams. They only fell behind Bloomington North, Castle, and Bloomington South. Springs Valley’s girls battled through injuries, but still managed to score points in a number of events. It wasn’t a perfect performance, nor was it Springs Valley’s best effort, but it will be a valuable experience for the Blackhawks as they rapidly approach the business end of their season. “Hopefully we get some growth out of it. We learned some stuff about ourselves, we’ve got a few things that we noticed. Some of our kids are hurting a little bit and we’ve kind of learned where we’re at with that — hope we can get some of those things cleared up — but I love the way that we competed,” Springs Valley coach Derek Freeman said. “I loved how we gritted our teeth and went after people from bigger schools. We didn’t back down from anybody today and that’s what a regional atmosphere is. That’s what we did and I was very proud of it.” One of the biggest moments of the afternoon for the Blackhawks came right before the end. Carson Brown lined up to compete in the two-mile run and less than 10 minutes after the starting gun, he finished the race with not only a second-place finish but a school record as well. The sophomore recorded a time of 9:53.54, an incredible 25 seconds faster than his previous personal record and nine seconds faster than the previous school record set by his older brother, junior Grant Brown. Perhaps most impressively, Freeman knows that the younger Brown still has quite a bit of improvement left in him. “It’s funny because I’m extremely excited for him, but I’m also trying to get him to realize that he still has a lot more in the tank,” Freeman said. “When he finishes races, he’s not tired and I’m trying to tell him that he’s holding too much back. He’s got a negative split, his second mile was faster than his first mile. He’s got a lot more left in the tank and he doesn’t realize how to exert it, but he’s young. “I’m ecstatic for what’s going to come because I know what he’s capable of, where he can go from here, and that’s the fun part of it.” The distance crew aside, the Blackhawks also performed well in the field events. Christian Hamilton won the long jump, recording a leap of 21-2, for example. But across the board Springs Valley’s throwers had a strong outing as well. Larron Childers did Larron Childers things, placing third in the discus with a throw of 155-8 and then finishing sixth in the shot put as well. Xander Cook was right behind him in the shot put, placing ninth. Ella Meehan scored in the shot put, placing eighth, and Sarah Drabing scored in the discus, also in eighth. That group will have a chance to win championships in the coming weeks with county, conference, and sectional meets all approaching quickly and ahead of those opportunities, they’ll keep honing in on their technique like they did on Saturday. “We’re working on technical things right now, fine-tuning some stuff, and some of it was great, some of it wasn’t,” Freeman said. “When it finally clicks for somebody like Larron, it might be a dangerous thing with a disk. We’re working on some stuff with Sarah and when it clicks, it’s going to be really big in the disk. These kids are starting to get big on technical stuff and even at a big meet like today’s, we’re using it as a technical meet. We’re just hoping that those things are starting to click a little bit and then they’ll be that way all the time. We saw a little bit of it while we were competing today.” The Blackhawk boys also got points from Alan Marshall, who finished third in the mile with a new personal record of 4:36, Grant Brown, who finished fifth in the two-mile run, Isaiah Ervin and Evan Baker in the 400, and Jaheim Hamilton in the long jump, 300-meter hurdles, and 110-meter hurdles. Max Pendley, Carson Brown, Grant Brown, and Marshall finished third in the 3200-meter relay. Springs Valley was fourth in the 400- and 1600-meter relays. Sophie Harris was the girls’ top scorer, placing fifth in the two-mile. Other scorers included Miya Campbell in the 200-meter, Kinsey Saliba in the long jump, and the team of Saliba, Campbell, Brynne Buchanan, and Danieca Green in the 400-meter relay. Now Springs Valley will try to kick things into gear with just two events left before they compete at the Patoka Lake Athletic Conference Meet. On Friday they’ll head south for the North Harrison Invite, then three days later they’ll compete with Orleans and Shoals as a final tune-up. “They need to realize that we’re almost there. Sometimes we kind of act like we still have a whole three months left,” Freeman said. “I think we need to do the little things better and when we do, we’ll become a very dangerous team. As we get closer to the end we have a team full of guts and effort, we just have to do the little things to be prepared like having our body prepared: making sure we’re getting plenty of sleep and hydration and eating properly. We just have to make sure that every aspect of it is something that we dive into and when we do, we’ll be dangerous.” MUSTANG INVITATIONAL - BOYS TEAM SCORES Bloomington North 158, Castle 111, Bloomington South 91, Springs Valley 73.5, Edgewood 60, Mooresville 51.5, West Vigo 26, Decatur Central 24.5, Cloverdale 18.5 100: Johnson, BN, 10.76; Roach, WV, 11.02; Shin, BN, 11.04. 200: Rheam, BS, 23.13; Kramer, CAS, 23.37; Cosner, BS, 23.38. 400: Bishop, BN, 54.14; Daines, CAS, 54.40; Ryan, BS, 54.91. 800: Winders, BN, 2:00.40; Bullock, BS, 2:01.18; D’Onofrio, BN, 2:06.90. 1,600: Clark, BN, 4:33.46; D’Onofrio, BN, 4:35.98; Marshall, SV, 4:36.42. 3,200: Clark, BN, 9:46.25; C. Brown, SV, 9:53.54; Meyer, ED, 10:01.49. 110H: Rustman, MOR, 15.07; Murphy, BN, 15.34; Law, ED, 15.73. 300H: Jackson, CLO, 42.49; Fouts, CAS, 43.51; Liell-Beyene, BS, 44.02 SP: Montgomery, WV, 51-8; Wynalda, BN, 51-6; Bracher, CAS, 51-0. DT: Bracher, CAS, 157-6; Mikulich, BN, 156-10; Childers, SV, 155-8. LJ: C. Hamilton, SV, 20-2; Berry, BS, 19-7; Cheng, BN, 19-5.5. HJ: Dodo, DC, 5-10; Broadus, MOR, 5-10; Norris, ED, 5-8. 400R: BN, 43.89; BS, 44.37; CAS, 44.89. 1,600R: BN, 3:32.10; BS, 3:33.43; CAS, 3:41.71. 3,200R: BN, 8:18.37; CAS, 8:27.13; SV, 8:36.42. MUSTANG INVITATIONAL - GIRLS TEAM SCORES Bloomington North 119, Bloomington South 108.5, Noblesville 105, Castle 68.83, Edgewood 66, Princeton 56.5, West Vigo 27.33, Mooresville 23.33, Decatur Central 23, Cloverdale 12, Springs Valley 8.5 100: Royal, CAS, 12.39; DeGroote, WV, 12.51; Elliott, BN, 12.60. 200: DeGroote, WV, 25.82; Deemer, BN, 27.04; Bailey, BS, 27.06. 400: Barada, BS, 58.57; Edwards, ED, 1:02.61; Zaccardelli, CAS, 1:04.30. 800: Myers, BS, 2:18.19; Somers, BN, 2:19.13; Seibert, CAS, 2:28.88. 1,600: Giannini, CAS, 5:42.06; Breidenbaugh, PRI, 5:46.35; McGuire, BN, 5:47.14. 3,200: He. Meade, PRI, 11:20.20; Ha. Meade, PRI, 11:20.34l Giannini, CAS, 12:20.31. 100H: Eberle, BN, 15.22; Polito, ED, 15.94; Shaevitz, BS, 16.36. 300H: Polito, ED, 48.01; Sweet, BS, 52.10; Goerges, ED, 52.11. SP: Alexander, NOB, 46-1; Lucas, BN, 45-3; Hurt, CAS, 36-4. DT: Alexander, NOB, 141-3; Lucas, BN; 140-3; Garnett, DC, 115-5. LJ: Eberle, BN, 16-11.50; Hayden, ED, 16-6; Shaevitz, BS, 16-0.50. HJ: Miller, NOB, 5-4; Hassan, NOB, 5-2; Woodard, DC, 4-10. 400R: BN, 50.96; BS, 51.77; ED, 52.42. 1,600R: BN, 4:12.09; NOB, 4:14.62; BS, 4:26.63. 3,200R: BS, 9:59.97; BN, 10:09.87; PRI, 10:15.67.