Sweep of relays help Negaunee Miners take both titles at WIN track & field meets

May 12, 2023

ISHPEMING — Negaunee used a sweep of the relays to power its way to a pair of victories at the WIN meet in high school track and field on Tuesday at the Ishpeming Playgrounds.

WIN — the initials of the west-end schools involved, Westwood, Ishpeming and Negaunee — meets are held in numerous sports during their regular seasons throughout the school year.

Negaunee outdistanced the field in the girls meet, scoring 105 points to 36 for runner-up Ishpeming and 35 for third-place Westwood.

The Miners pulled out a much closer victory for the boys, accumulating 94 points to 77 for the runner-up Hematites as Westwood scored 6.

Here are highlights from each meet:

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Negaunee girls dominant

Madison Pekrul had a hand in two of the Miners’ relay victories while winning two individual events as well.

She took the 100-yard hurdles and 300 low hurdles while running a leg in Negaunee's winning 800 and 1,600 relays.

Teammate Olivia Lunseth also had a hand in both kinds of wins, taking the 200 and running on the 400 and 800 relay winners.

The relay wins were important as the Miners only won five of the 13 individual events. Negaunee's two other individual wins were turned in by Eliana Juchemich in the shot put and discus.

In relays, the Miners’ Seere Helms-Gleason, Marlee Plaxco, Mason DellAngelo and Maddie Beaudry each ran on two winning relay teams.

Ishpeming's one-woman wrecking crew was Lola Korpi, who accounted for all three of her team's wins in the 800, 1,600 and 3,200.

Like Korpi, Westwood's Faith Spiroff also won three events, taking the 100, 400 and long jump, while the Patriots’ Lexi Olson almost made it a clean sweep for Westwood in field events as she won the pole vault and high jump.

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Miners boys win close one

Negaunee again needed its sweep of relays to insure its WIN meet victory as the Miners took seven individual events.

Seven athletes accounted for those individual wins for NHS — Kurtis Kangas in the 100 hurdles, Judge Anderson in the 800, Kai Lacar in the 200, John Plaxco in the 3,200, Nico Lukkarinen in the shot put, Joseph Rosten in the pole vault and Brady Mager in the high jump.

Mager also ran on the Miners’ winning 1,600 relay and Lacar on the victorious 400 relay, while Anderson and Plaxco were members of the NHS 3,200 relay winners.

Several Negaunee runners were multi-relay winners, led by Chase Bonovetz with a trio of wins in the 400, 800 and 1,600 relays. Doubling up relay wins were teammates Broc Bonovetz, Anthony Gleason and Blayne LaCosse.

All that was just enough to counteract Ishpeming's Tramon Gauthier, who chalked up a triple-win day as he took the 100, 300 low hurdles and long jump.

The Hematites matched Negaunee with a total of six individual wins as Levi Nicholls won the 1,600, Preston Gauthier the 400 and Aidan Rajala the discus.

Information compiled by Journal Sports Editor Steve Brownlee. His email address is [email protected].

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