Boys track advances to state
By Dan Truttschel
Correspondent
It’s safe to say East Troy High School boys track coach Josh Herrell has seen a lot in his 14-year career.
But even Herrell was left speechless by what he saw at last week’s Wisconsin Interscholastic Athletic Association Division 2 East Troy Sectional.
And it was a good speechless at that.
The Trojans’ 3,200-meter relay team cut an amazing 18 seconds off their school-record time to finish second, punch their tickets to state and join a number of East Troy sectional highlights.
In all, the East Troy boys advanced to this weekend’s Division 2 State Meet on the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse campus in five events en route to a fourth-place team finish.
Milwaukee Lutheran won the team title with 95 points, followed by Brown Deer with 57, Catholic Memorial with 54, East Troy with 53 and Shorewood with 51.
Extending their season through this weekend were senior Miles Kilpin and junior Jake Wendt in the discus, seniors Charlie Kutschenreuter and Nathan Nguyen in the 400 and the 3,200-relay team of Jake Remza, Evan Harding, Nguyen and Kutschenreuter.
While each effort was special in its own right, Herrell said the relay time of 8:00.07 was the “most phenomenal performance of the day and quite possible my 14-year career.”
Herrell added he had a glimpse of what that group could do when it set the school record of 8:18.56 three weeks ago.
“At that point, we knew we had a shot to qualify for state, which would be the first time in school history a (3,200-meter) relay team on the boys’ side has ever qualified for state.”
All four runners surpassed previous best times in their part of the relay – Remza, Harding and Nguyen were four seconds faster and Kutschenreuter was three.
Herrell added that Nguyen’s split of 1:57.8 would have set the school record in the 800.
Adding to the feat was that East Troy narrowly got beaten by the Shorewood team at the finish line. Earlier this season, Shorewood won the Kansas Relay title.
“I was simply speechless,” Herrell said. “Each runner truly fed off the energy of the runner that handed off to him.”
Kilpin brought home a sectional title in the discus with a winning toss of 168-01. Other state-bound sectional results had Kutschenreuter second in the 400 (50.13), Wendt fourth in the discus (154-9) and Nguyen fourth in the 400 (50.13).
Looking ahead to state, the Trojans’ 3,200-meter relay team enters the meet seeded second, only behind the Shorewood team. Both foursomes will compete in the second heat of the timed finals in the first running event of the meet Friday morning.
Kilpin also is seeded second, while Wendt is seeded 10th, in the finals of the discus. The top seed belongs to Brodhead-Juda senior Logan Maurer of 171-2. That event will kick off the state meet’s field events, also at 9:30 a.m.
In the 400, Kutschenreuter will run in the first heat of the prelims in the eighth lane, while Nguyen will compete in the second lane of the second heat Friday morning. The top seed in that event belongs to Freedom senior Collin Hofacker.
Other sectional results
Also competing in the sectional were Kilpin, fifth in the shot put (50-2); the 1,600-meter relay team of Nguyen, sophomore Evan Harding, Remza and Kutschenreuter, sixth (3:27.99); senior Anthony Leahy, sixth in the high jump (6-0); sophomore Billy Dominski, sixth in the 110-hurdles (16.44); sophomore Truman Kent, seventh in the 110-hurdles (24.18) and 11th in the 300-hurdles (43.09); senior Brody Kazik, eighth in the 3,200 (10:15); and the 800-meter relay team of freshman Denver Roberts, senior Joey Dominski, Billy Dominski and sophomore Allen Olson, 12th (1:38.59).
