MURFREESBORO – It’s one thing to win one state championship in track.
It becomes a tougher challenge to repeat and at times impossible to even think about a three-peat.
But that’s what the Signal Mountain Lady Eagles did here at the Dean A. Hayes Track & Soccer Stadium on the campus of Middle Tennessee State University early Thursday evening.
Signal Mountain had a nose-to-nose battle with East Nashville from the start as both teams finished the field events with 29 points.
It was a see-saw affair the rest of the afternoon in the running finals as the lead just kept swapping back and forth.
Finally, in the 3200 run – the next to last event of the day – senior Stephanie Peterson ran one of the most inspiring races of her career to finish second to give her team a six-point lead with just the 1600 relay left.
All Signal Mountain had to do was finish fourth or better, regardless of what East Nashville did, but they surprised the overflow crowd and even themselves a little bit by posting their fastest time of the season by almost 10 seconds as they won the race and put an exclamation point on that third title with100 points.
East Nashville, which also finished second last year by a 96-72 margin, was second again with 90 points.
The margin of victory was 10 points, but everyone present knows that it was much closer than that.
“We’re trying, but we still have one more event to go,” said Signal Mountain coach Dustin Carpenter while the Class AAA 3200 run was still in progress.
“Stephanie Peterson’s performance in the 3200 was huge as that eight team points gave us a six-point lead. Her father died earlier this week and she’ll be attending his funeral tomorrow, but she wasn’t going to miss this meet for anything.
“But we’ve had a great meet today as we’ve had a few breaks fall our way. East Nashville had a girl get disqualified in the 300 hurdles and that was critical.
“We’ve never broken 4:10 this year as that was a clutch performance on our part. That was just icing on the cake,” Carpenter said once that final race had been completed.
Peterson, a really talented senior who earned All-State honors in cross country, was really emotional as expected when she had finished the 3200.
“I just wanted to do everything I could to help our team win,” she said with tears streaming down her cheeks.
Taylor Luthringer, a spirited junior who was really disappointed with her performances in the 1600 and 800 runs where she finished fourth and sixth, came back with redemption on her mind as the anchor of the 1600 relay.
Emma Johnson and Katie Lingle had given the Lady Eagles the lead midway through while sophomore Avery Engels had maintained a similar pace on the third lap.
Luthringer got the baton in a crowd to start the final leg and quickly moved to the front, only to be passed by the East Nashville anchor on the far turn with 200 meters remaining.
The pony-tailed blonde then shifted into another gear and completely ran away in that final stretch as the Lady Eagles won with a time of 4:01.88 while East Nashville was a distant runner-up in 4:03.37.
“That was the best race of my life as we just had to win,” said Luthringer while accepting hugs and high fives from her running mates.
“I was so upset with my first two races, but I was more than pumped for that last one. That was a great way for us to finish up and a PR for us by like 10 seconds. I just don’t know how we did it,” she added.
While Peterson and the 1600 relay were the late heroes, there were others along the way who made it possible for the team race to be that close when it counted.
Take Camryn Bowman and McKenzie Ethridge for instance.
Bowman scored 18 points with a win in the shot put and a second in the discus while Ethridge won the 100 and 200 dashes for the third year (she was hurt and didn’t compete her freshman year) after anchoring the winning 400 relay team.
Bowman got a quick start in the discus with a throw of 126 feet, 11 inches on her first attempt and went even further with a 129-5 on her last attempt, only to have West Greene’s Kaci Ray unleash her best of 132-11 on the final throw of the competition.
“I’m normally very nervous, but for some reason, I wasn’t today,” the Signal Mountain junior explained before the awards were distributed.
“That was my personal best by two inches, so I’m not sad for second place. Kaci and have become good friends and I’m really happy for her to win as she just makes me better,” the defending discus state champ added.
She came into the shot put competition with the fifth-best qualifying distance, but ended up winning with a toss of 38 feet, three and three-quarters inches.
“It was very good, but I didn’t even know I had won because I was trying to help take care of Simone Hicks, a thrower from Brainerd who was competing with a broken foot. I had knee surgery in September and it took several months to get back, but I knew I was capable of winning today,” Bowman added.
Hicks broke her foot playing basketball a few weeks ago and had surgery two weeks ago. She competed with an orthopedic boot on her foot and still finished second with a best toss of 38 feet, three-quarters inch.
“I was hoping that my last attempt would be my best, but it ended up being my worst. I wish I could have done better, but I could have been sitting up in the stands today,” Hicks said with a smile.
While Bowman was the leader in the field events for Signal Mountain, Ethridge easily won the 100 and 200 dashes and broke from a pack at the start of the last 100 meters in the 400 relay to win that race going away.
“I got off to a pretty good start, but I was hoping to get under 12 seconds,” she said after posting a time of 12.19 seconds to win the 100 for the third time.
“The wind was not in our favor, but I’d much rather have the wind than the cold temperatures we had last year. I guess we just have to take what we can get, but it’s a great feeling for me to cap off my high school career with another state title in the 100” she said after that first win.
While Signal Mountain was winning with 100 points and East Nashville second with 90, CAK was third with 63 while Chattanooga School for the Arts & Sciences – more specifically Lennex Walker – was fourth with 41.
Tyner had three top-five finishers in the 100 to finish sixth with 30 points while Brainerd was ninth with 24 points after Ebony Calloway completely blew away the field in the 300 hurdles.
Chattanooga Christian was 14th with 18 points while Red Bank and East Ridge claimed 34th and 38th places with three and two points, respectively.
CSAS’s Walker was a one-girl team who won the 100 hurdles and triple jump after finishing second in the long jump. She had also finished second in the pentathlon on Monday.
“It was just like that last year when she won, but I had thought about it a lot and I had to finish strong today. Of course, I’m a little tired right now, but there are times when you just have to push through the pain. I have nothing to be sad about,” she said after a fourth –place finish in her final event, the 200 dash.
Brainerd’s Calloway had perhaps the most impressive margin of victory when she posted a time of 43.49 seconds to win the 300 hurdles. The runner-up was way back in 46.03 seconds.
“I fell in this race last year right over there and finished eighth,” she explained while pointing toward the next-to-last hurdle.
“I think I was leading at that point, but those girls came flying by and I ended up eighth. I couldn’t wait to get back here today as I was determined to win. I certainly didn’t want to fall again as I was completely focused on the finish line. And I wanted to make sure that nobody was beside me or ahead,” she added.
While Signal Mountain was the talk of the A-AA meet, there wasn’t much else for Chattanooga teams to cheer about.
Harpeth Hall won the Division II meet with 130.5 points, followed by Ensworth with 97 and Brentwood Academy with 89.5.
Baylor was seventh with 41 points while GPS was ninth with 26.
Sophomore Rachel Smith was the highest placing Baylor girl after taking third in the pole vault by clearing 11 feet.
“Pole vault is my favorite event in track, but I still have a lot of room to improve. I’m a lot happier today than I was last year when I finished fourth at 10 feet. I still have three more events, so I’m just getting started,” she said, noting that her personal best is now 11-4.
Ally Craig was third in the high jump at 5-2 while the 3200 relay team also finished third with a time of 10:00.20.
GPS had a runner-up finish in the 3200 relay with a time of 9:52.72 after getting edged at the finish by Harpeth Hall’s winning time of 9:51.63. Carley Braman, Mary Margaret Arrowsmith, Tori Tomakane and Kate McVay were on that team for the Bruisers.
Nicole Johnson was the leader for Tyner by finishing second in the 100 behind Ethridge with a time of 12.42 seconds. Teammates Alexis Wilson and Vivian Smith were third and fifth with times of 12.56 and 12.75 seconds, respectively.
Sydney Ibach equaled her best performance by clearing nine feet in the pole vault to finish second for Chattanooga Christian while Cleveland’s Maddie Coulthard cleared 11 feet to finish second in the pole vault.
Ooltewah’s Krystal Starling was fourth in the AAA shot put with a best effort of 41 feet, three inches.
Whitehaven was the AAA winner with 98 points while Ravenwood was second with 63 and Southwind third with 58.
Go to www.tssaa.org for complete results.
(email John Hunt at nomarathonmoose@gmail.com)