The Delaware Indoor State Track and Field Championships were held Feb. 11 at the University of Delaware Field House.

Cape Henlopen crowned two state champions on the girls' side as junior Kadijah Doughty won the shot put title with a toss of 36-feet-7-and-3/4 inches, and senior Kayla Albertella cleared 8-feet-9-inches in the pole vault. The Cape girls were fourth overall with 41 points, while the boys scored only 2 points and finished 21st overall.

The top place for Sussex Tech was turned in by Bethany Killman as she found herself in the fastest mile she has ever lined up for with three Tatnall runners to her inside, two nationally ranked. Bethany hung onto the lead pack for a few laps but was smart to back off and run her race against the second pack, which included a back-and-forth battle with tough sophomore Kennedy Wong of Ursuline. After the race, Killman and I went over splits she wanted to hit with a goal of a sub-5:30 mile, and for six of the eight she was right on pace. The hardworking Killman hit the line in fourth place, running 5:31.65.

Miler Sam Parsons of Tatnall was quite impressive, racing to a 4:24 indoor mile, but most people did not pay attention to the fact that he came through the 1,200-meter mark in 3:23, which equates to a final 400 meters in 61 seconds, translating to collegiate material on the end of a mile.

The top ninth-grader in the 800 meters was Cape’s Amir Conley in 14th place at 2:09.4.  The amazing thing about Amir was that he handled the 100, 200, and 400 meters for me when I coached him at Beacon. Not only is Amir a great athlete, but the young man was one of the hardest workers I have ever coached - never complained, always polite, and just one great kid.

Speaking of the 800 meters, one of the most exciting events of the day if you were a Henlopen Conference fan was the performance of senior Terrell Oliver of Caesar Rodney racing to a 1:57.97 dominating win. Oliver just missed the meet record of 1:57.56 set last year by Tyler Tate of Tatnall.

Senior Taiwan Savage Jr. helped his team to victory in the 3,200-meter relay and the 1,600-meter relay, ran a 2:06 in the open 800 meters, and threw in a 40-foot triple jump to close out a great career at Milford running for coach Czar Bloom. Taiwan Sr. competed for me in the early '90s and was a part of a few state championship teams for Cape Henlopen.

The Tatnall girls, led by coach Pat Castagno, scored 72 points by sweeping the three distance races, added 19 points in the three relays, threw in 5 points in the 400m and 4 points in the shot to total 100 points and win the championship easily with fewer than 10 girls scoring. The 72 distance sweep points would almost had been enough to win the meet as Padua finished second with 74 points.

My buddy Art Madric, former Glasgow coach and winner of 11 indoor state team championships, reminded me that I beat an army of Salesianum boys 82-74 in 1993 with only four boys scoring in the meet. We were down 12 points going into the triple jump with the state title on the line, and I told my four jumpers (Willie Savage, Bruce Pitts, Art Hugger and Nashon Selby) if they all scored we would win the tallest trophy and I would treat them to Happy Meals on our ride back to Lewes in the district station wagon. We placed first, second, fourth, and fifth for 24 points, and 20 minutes later they were playing with their Happy Meal toys as the championship trophy sat on the table at McDonald's in Newark.

The outdoor track and field season begins Thursday, March 1, with Matt Lindell leading the boys and George Pepper leading the girls for Cape Henlopen.  Lou Nicoletti will lead the Sussex Tech team. I will team up will Gilbert Maull, father of former Cape/Clemson All-American Kai Maull who is now coaching at St. Georges Tech, coaching the Beacon boys and girls...I'm out!