January 4th, 2013
The North Yarmouth Academy Panthers opened their regular season at the University of Southern Maine in Gorham on Friday night. The meet was against Cape Elizabeth, Fryeburg, Traip, St. Dom’s, Lake Region, Poland, and Wells. The boys team finished a respectable 5th out of 8 teams with only 7 boys competing while the girls finished 6th in a very close meet just a stone’s throw from 2nd. Anxiety levels and nerves were running high on Friday night as the first meet lasted significantly longer than expected and our start time of 6:30pm quickly became 8:00pm. Overall the meet was a great first effort and learning experience for the multitude of new athletes on the team.
The field events were able to get started early with the girls’ shot put. Muriel Adams was able to put together a strong throw of over 25′ to win the Jr. Girls’ Division. Shelby Peavey was a little off her best for the meet but her effort was still strong enough for 6th place while Ellis was able to hit a career best distance and finish just out of scoring contention. On the boys side Matt Benoit beat his season best for the 3rd meet in a row finishing just over 31′ which was good enough for a 4th place finish. The jumps were all going on early as well. Over at the high jump pits Nyajal Ngoal hopped in the Sr. Division at the last minute to grab the team some points. With no practice under her belt she was still able to clear the opening height and finish 4th. 
In the Jr. Girls division Emily Taylor hit a new season best height of 4′ which was good for 6th while Acacia Bright looked great over 3’10” but struggled at 4′ and finished just out of the top 6. In the long jump pits the big improvement of the night was by Linnea Hull who jumped almost a 6″ season best to hit 12’2.25″ which put her in the top 10. Jen Brown also got 3 successful attempts in after struggling to hit her mark last week which helped her finish with a solid improvement on her distances. On the boys side Matt Malcom was just inches off of his career best which also was good for a top 10 finish. In the triple jump Jillian Bjorn-Caron jumped a new season best distance of 25′ which was good for 4th place while Linnea Hull was close behind in 24′ and good for 5th place. Claire Maurer struggled a little with her ankles but still was able to finish just out of the top 6 in 7th. On the boys side Jake Burns and Ben Claytor teamed up to finish 3rd and 4th respectively.
On the track the hurdlers had a successful day with all 3 hurdlers running season bests. Jillian Bjorn-Caron dropped her time to 10.32 which was good for 2nd place in the Sr. Division and a 3rd place position on the Girls top 5 all-time list. Maura Anderson ran a career best time dropping .14 seconds off of her all-time best. Jake Burns won the Sr. Division in a time of 8.99 which was also good enough to qualify him to compete in the State Championships. The sprints opened with the 55m dash where Matt Malcom ran his first real individual sprint race finishing just out of the top 10. Ben Claytor had a strong start to finish 14th in the boys Sr. Division while Dean Walters ran his career best by almost .1 seconds to finish 7th in 7.26. On the girls side Emily Taylor and Maddie Cutten were the top 10 top finishers in the Jr. Division with Emily placing 6th to earn a point for the team. In the Sr. Division Abby McKelvy ran a strong first sprint race to finish in 9.56. In the 200m Maddie Cutten was the top NYA finisher in the Jr. Division running 32.23 to finish in 8th place while Jillian Bjorn-Caron and Jen Brown both finished in the top 10 in the Sr. Division. Jillian actually ran a time good enough for 6th place and a point for the team. On the boys side Dean Walters and Aldis Gamble hit career bests. Dean finished in 5th in a meet stacked with sprinters in a time of 25.58 while Aldis dropped almost 2 seconds off of his best ever time to run 27.86. In the 400m Matt Malcom was the sole representative for the boys team and was able to finish 4th in the Jr. Division. On the girls side only the Jr. Division was represented as well but they left a mark. Emily Taylor, Muriel Adams, and Linnea Hull all ran season bests. Emily and Muriel both scored for the team, finishing 2nd and 4th respectively.
In the distance races NYA was represented by our 3 distance runners – Hannah Austin and Ellis on the girls side and John LeBlanc on the boys. Hannah ran the 800m and the 2 mile and placed highly in both. Hannah ran a career best by over 10 seconds in the 800m to finish the race in 2nd with a time of 2:41 (just 1 second off of the state qualifying time) and then was able to come back and cruise to an easy win in the 2 mile. Her time in the 2 mile of 13:01 was good enough to qualify her for the state championships and was also over 10 seconds faster than her career best time. Ellis ran her first distance race of the season after training primarily for the shotput yet was still able to run very close to her career best. John LeBlanc opened with the mile where he ran just over 5:20 which was good for 5th place and then came back to run the 2 mile for the first time ever and ran a smart, controlled, steady race to finish in 3rd place.
The relays ran late at night which, I think, hindered the hand-offs a bit however the experience is exactly what we needed. The Jr. Girls relay of Maddie C., Muriel A., Shelby P., and Ellis finished in 5th place after a very close race. The freshman team of Linnea H., Acacia B., Emily T., and Claire M. ran as the ‘B’ team which is a non-scoring relay but ran the exact same time as the other relay. In the Sr. Division Nyajal, Jen, Maura, and Jillian combined for an effort good enough for 2nd place. On the boys side only the Sr. Div boys had a relay and Dean, Aldis, Ben, and Jake competed well to finish in 5th.
The team is back in action at USM this coming Friday the 11th at 6:30pm.