Delaware Christian’s Lyssi Snouffer nabbed a pair of top-three finishes in Division III, Luke Walden became the first Olentangy Berlin athlete to compete at the state showcase in D-II and Olentangy Orange had a couple relay teams compete in finals at the D-I level to highlight the opening day of the OHSAA State Track and Field Championships Friday at OSU’s Jesse Owens Memorial Stadium.
Snouffer has been on another level all season long, and Friday was no exception. She cruised through the first handful of heights in the high jump, easily clearing 5-0, 5-02 and 5-04 on the first try.
The junior ran into her first bit of trouble at 5-05, missing once before clearing the height on her second attempt, then cleared 5-07 after passing at 5-06.
Snouffer was good. Really good. But, Springfield Catholic Central’s Mallory Mullen was a tiny bit better. Both jumpers cleared 5-07 before missing three straight at 5-08. Mullen, though, earned the title thanks to fewer misses at the previous heights. After passing up the first, 4-10, she successfully cleared the next seven before her first misses of the day came at 5-08.
Snouffer was solid in the long jump a few hours earlier, too, finishing third with a mark of 18-01. Leipsic’s Carlee Siefker took the crown with an effort of 18-05 while Ridgewood’s Alexis Prater finished second with a distance of 18-04.
Thanks to Snouffer’s showings, coupled with the fact just six events were scored after the first day, Delaware Christian sits in third in the team standings with 14 points.
In D-II, the Bears’ Walden, just a sophomore, finished ninth after clearing 14-02 in the boys pole vault.
In other action, Buckeye Valley’s girls 4×800 relay team of Chloe Dawson, Jia Radloff, Bailey Kreft and Ashley Beatty finished 11th with a time of 9:37.70 — bettering their regional mark by 10 seconds — and the Barons’ Charlie Daily finished 18th in the preliminaries of the 400-meter dash in 51.24 seconds.
Finally, Olentangy Orange competed in a pair of finals in D-I. The girls 4×800 quartet of Lindsay Ott, Abby Schroff, Quinn Shannon and Allison Guagenti finished 16th in 9:25.09. The boys 4×800 team of Lincoln Weber, Kyle Stringer, Jay Shin and Jaryd Adu-Owusu, meanwhile, finished 18th in 8:40.56.
The state meet wraps up today with Division III track finals getting things started at 9:30 a.m. Division II track finals will follow at 1 p.m. with Division I action set to start around 4:30 p.m. Half of the Division II field event finals and all of the D-I field event finals will also be contested.
