NN Girls are 2012 All-State Champions;Wong, Forbes Set Records

Carla Forbes scored 18 points in the long jump and 55 dash, and Kayla Wong scored 11 in the long jump and 55 hurdles, and that would have been enough to get past Lincoln-Sudbury for the State Championship. However, the Tigers added points in the 600 (Meghan Bellerose, 8th), 300 (Maddie Nadeau, 6th), and won the 4x400 in a state-leading 3:56.77 to amass 41 points and pull away from L-S and everyone else for the title.

Although Forbes, Nadeau, and Bellerose are juniors and will be back, Coach Joe Tranchita went out of his way to praise the seniors on the team. He might specifically have been thinking of Wong, who ran a school record 8.13 in the 55 hurdles to place 3rd (behind an all-state record and first-ever sub 8.00 clocking of 7.98 from Brockton's Vanessa Clerveaux), and added a 17-2 long jump for 6th, and a leg on the winning relay.

As for Forbes, she set a new meet record and school record in the long jump, exceeding 20 feet with a monster leap of 20-01.25 (see video below). She nearly had another win in the 55 dash, but Attleboro's Briana Robitaille was 0.01 faster and Forbes had to settle for second.

In all, it was an incredible day to cap off an incredible season for the Tigers.
It was also great to see them sharing the spotlight with the boys team, who were co-champions with Mansfield. While the girls were favorites, and their meet didn't come down to the relay, they lived up to -- and exceeded -- the high expectations set for them, and that's perhaps the hardest thing to do.

Relays Propel NN Boys to State Championship

You can't make this stuff up.

With one event remaining, boys team scores at the 2012 Massachusetts All-State Indoor track Championships stood like this:

Lowell             24
Mansfield          24
Pembroke           24
Acton-Boxboro      20
Brookline          20
Catholic Memorial  19
Newton North       19

Lowell didn't have a team in the 4x400 -- they would have been one of the favorites except for the unfortunate finish in the Div I championships that eliminated their team. A-B, Mansfield, Newton North, and Pembroke all had very strong teams, and all were running together in the final heat.

For Newton North, it was pretty simple: win the race and there was a slim chance; anything less and there was none. Rising to the challenge, Jim Blackburn's boys took control of the race early, with Ryan Lucken, Shawn Seamons and Orion Wagner giving anchor Daniel Swain a lead heading into the final 400. But Acton-Boxboro's Brian Sommers came charging back and passed Swain, bidding to give A-B the title. Swain responded on the backstretch of the final lap, and powered home, as the Tigers finished in 3:24.34, the fastest time in the state this year. A-B hung on for 2nd in 3:25.65.

Newton North got an assist from Newton South -- the Lions finished 3rd, pushing Mansfield down to 4th and Pembroke to 6th. North's 10 points and Mansfield's 5 in the final event made them co-champions with 29 points each. A-B's 8 points left them one point back at, and Pembroke's 6th gave them 27 points, a point behind A-B. I can't ever remember a meet where the final standings were shuffled so thoroughly in the final seconds of the final race.

North was in position thanks to outstanding performances earlier in the meet. The Tigers got their first points of the day from Justin Keefe who took 6th place (2:32.35) in an absolutely loaded 1000m.

North got their only individual win of the day from All-State champion Swardick Mayanja, who spun his way to a personal best throw of 59-06.25, nearly four feet further than second place.

With two events left, North had 13 points and two strong relays. The 4x200 team did its job, with the quartet of Lucken, Nate Menninger, Swain, and Seamons running 1:32.00 to place 3rd, and set up the final dramatic 4x400.

2012 All-State Indoor Track Championships - Results
Coverage in Boston Globe
Coverage in Boston Herald
Coverage on MA Milesplit

NN Boys Take Advantage of Lowell's Slip;Tie for 2nd at DI Championships

The Newton North boys rode a surge of points in the shot put and two second-place finishes in the 4x2 and 4x4 relays to score 40 points and tie Lowell for the runner-up trophy at the DI Championships Sunday.

The final scores for the top three teams were the result of a bizarre finish in the 4x400 relay that propelled Acton-Boxborough to its first-ever indoor state title, and left Lowell stunned. Heading into the final event, Lowell (40 points) held a 5-point lead over A-B (35) and an 8-point lead over Newton North (32) and Brookline (32). With the second-seeded relay, the championship was within reach.

And everything seemed to be going right through the first three legs, with their anchor runner taking the baton cleanly only tenths of a second behind Newton North. But 100 meters into the race and needing only to play it safe, Lowell's runner tried to pass without a full stride and made contact with North's anchor. A yellow flag went up, meaning that the referee would have to decide whether the infraction was grounds for disqualification. But it never came to that. In the final strides of the race, as A-B took the lead, and Lowell and NN battled for 2nd, the Lowell runner lost his balance, stumbled, and fell to the track, inches from the finish line. He never crossed it. A-B got the win and the team title. North got 8 points for second. With a DNF, Lowell had to settle for sharing the runner-up team position with Newton.

The drama notwithstanding, it was a terrific race for North, who ran a season's best time of 3:26.67. North's 4x200 team had also come through in a big way, with Ryan Lucken, Nate Menninger, Shawn Seamans, and Daniel Swain taking second behind Chelmsford in a time of 1:31.93.

North had scored its first points of the afternoon in the 1000, with Justin Keefe taking a hard-fought 4th in 2:32.67. Keefe had been in 2nd most of the race behind Framingham's Ben Groleau, but was caught in the final strides by A-B's Tim Cox and Haverhill's Mike McNaughton. NN sophomore Gabe Montague finished 9th in 2:34.93.

In the shot put, Swardick Mayanja rocked the gym with his fifth throw, a monster personal best of 58-11.5. You can watch it yourself, below. Meanwhile, Young Guang threw 50' even to take 3rd, and Leslie Whitham threw 47-2 to take 6th, giving the Tigers a total of 19 points in the event.



Congratulations to the NN boys, almost all of whom will compete at the State Meet next Sunday.

2012 DI Indoor Track and Field Championships - Results

A Team in Full:NN Girls Win 3rd Straight DI Championship

Photo: NewtonSportsPhotography.com)

It didn't come down to the 4x400 relay this time.

By the time the final event was called to the track, Newton North already owned an insurmountable lead in the race for the Div I team title. To everyone's admiration but no one's surprise, Carla Forbes had won the 55 and LJ; Kayla Wong had taken 2nd in the hurdles and 4th in the LJ; Maddie Nadeau had placed 3rd in the 300, and Meghan Bellerose had placed 5th in the 600; North earned even more points in the Long Jump from Kayla Prior and Maeve Larkin who placed 6th and 7th in that event; a 6th in the 4x800 and 4th in the 4x200 had sealed the deal.

So all that was left to prove was... well, champions always feel like there's something to prove. So the team of Bellerose, Nadeau, Isabella Reilly, and Forbes finished the meet by winning its final event, Forbes (57.9) holding off a spirited charge from A-B's Ellen Conway. North's time of 4:00.84 was the fastest time in the Commonwealth this season, and a fitting finale to their third straight championship at this meet.

Although, incredibly, the Tigers would have won the meet without the 20 points they earned in the Long Jump, that event seemed to sum up North's strengths -- great individual efforts and great depth. There was Forbes, the consummate competitor, taking each jump as if her life depended on it. On her final attempt, having jumped two feet farther than anyone else, she still wasn't satisfied. Her final leap of 19-9 was her best of the day and surpassed Arantxa King's "untouchable" meet record of 19-6.5. Meanwhile Wong, Prior, and Larkin were taking 3 of the next 6 places. The four NN jumpers AVERAGED 17-5. Amazing.

It was, I thought, a great meet for Kayla Wong and Maddie Nadeau. Both athletes had excellent individual events and were key contributors on their respective relays. Nadeau ran the second leg of the winning 4x400, splitting a 58.2 to open up a huge lead for Reilly and Forbes.

As for Forbes, what more can you say? Still a junior, she has FIVE individual indoor DI titles to go with FOUR individual outdoor titles. She also two indoor relay titles. She has won the long jump in all five season in which she has competed. With her performance in 2012, she has become the second Newton/Newton North athlete in history (after Tanya Jones) to score more than 100 points at the Class A/Division I level, her total standing at 102.5.

On to the State Meet!

2012 Div I State Indoor Championships - Results

In Memoriam: David Bell 1983-2012

David Bell, one in a long line of great shot putters from Newton North, passed away yesterday at the age of 28 from brain cancer.

Bell excelled in track & field and football at Newton North, Northfield Mt. Herman, and the University of Rhode Island. Bell graduated from NNHS in 2002. During the indoor track season that winter, he won the shot put at the State Coaches meet (55-6.5) and finished 6th at the National Scholastic Championships, earning All-American.

After NNHS, Bell attended Northfield Mt. Herman for a year. While there, he set the NMH school record in the shot put (56-0), which still stands, and earned All-New England honors in both football and track. At URI, Bell continued to compete in the throws for four years while earning a B.A. in Sociology.

After graduation from URI, Bell had been working as a group leader for YMCA of Boston. In the fall of 2011, he served as a volunteer coach for the Newton North Football team. He had hoped to do the same for the track team, but his illness made that impossible.

I had the good fortune to start as an assistant with Newton North in the spring of 2001, so I got to watch David his senior year. He was a great competitor and a real leader. He could throw an iron ball a long way, but he was quick and graceful as a big cat. It's hard to believe that someone so full of life has left us so early.

NN Survives Walpole; Streak Lives On

Newton North vs. Walpole was as close as predicted, a rollicking back and forth scrum for every available point. With only the relay remaining, Walpole clung to a two-point advantage. Alas, having to win the 4x400 against Newton is always a tall order, and this night was no different. The Tigers did what they do -- they put four fast runners on the track, they passed the baton, and in the end, it was enough to prevail 49-46 over the Rebels and keep their increasingly preposterous dual-meet unbeaten streak alive for another year.

Walpole had several chances to deck their opponent early. In the first race of the night, Newton sophomore Mike Schlichting held off Walpole sophomore Anthony DiVirgilio for second place in the mile by two-tenths of a second. No one knew it at the time, but that four point swing was huge. With NN's Justin Keefe and Zach Ganshirt trading wins in the mile and 1000, Daniel Swain won a crucial race against Bryan Rockwood in the 600 by a mere 0.07.

Walpole came right back with PJ Hayes winning a photo finish against Ryan Lucken in the 300. Both runners were given the same time -- 36.27 -- but Hayes was better by a few thousandths of a second.

Meanwhile, Walpole's Connor McCarthy PR'ed in the high jump at 5-7, putting the pressure on the North jumpers. Had McCarthy been able to get a clean clearance at 5-9, Walpole would have been in the driver's seat, but after three misses, he had to settle for third behind Hansen Yang and Nick Fofana.

However, McCarthy did his damage in other events, winning the 55 hurdles and long jump. Hayes won the 55 dash, and placed second in the long jump. Between the two of them, they accounted for 25 of Walpole's 46 points.

North swept the shot put, as expected, but Walpole countered with a 1-2 finish in the 2-Mile, setting up the fateful relay.


Results of Walpole vs. Newton North Boys Meet

The girls also had a meet last night -- against Herget Champs, Natick -- and it was also expected to be close. However, the Tigers showed no drop-off from their recent high level of performance and pulled away for a comfortable 66-29 win.

In the early events, Evie Heffernan won the mile, Miller McCarthy-Tuohy won a close race against Annie McElaney, and Meghan Bellerose ran a PR 1:38.56 to win the 600. In the 300 -- one of the critical events of the night for Natick -- Carla Forbes and Madi Nadeau went 1-2 against one of Natick's best athletes, Laurie Femmel, and there was little doubt about the eventual outcome after that.

Results of Natick vs. Newton North Girls Meet