By By SCOTT NOVAK / Dowagiac Daily News
Dowagiac junior Ann O'Keefe and the Chieftains' 400-meter relay team tied and set a new school record Friday night at the Division 2 regional meet held at Allegan High School.
O'Keefe successfully defended her regional championship in the pole vault when she tied her own school record with a time of 10-feet. O'Keefe just barely missed breaking the record when she attempted 10-3.
Dowagiac's 400-meter relay team of O'Keefe, Katy Stuppy, Sada Nealey and Ashley Urbanski set a new school record with a time of 51.2 in winning the regional title.
Dowagiac also set a school record last year at the Division 2 regional in the 400-meters.
Big 16 Conference West Division champion St. Joseph won its third consecutive regional championship as the Lady Bears amassed 65 points.
Paw Paw was second with 62 points. Host Allegan finished third with 58.5 points.
Dowagiac finished sixth and Lakeshore 11th with 36 and 21 points respectively. The Niles girls' team finished 13th with 16 points.
Urbanski was also third in the long jump with a leap of 15-6 and third in the 100-meters with a time of 13.13.
Nealey was fourth in the long jump with a distance of 15-5.5.
Stuppy finished seventh in the 200-meters with a time of 28.2. Urbanski was tied for seventh in the pole vault with a height of 8-feet.
It was 20 years in the making, but the Niles boys' track team can once again call itself regional champions.
The Vikings, who captured the Big 16 West Division title this season with a perfect 4-0 record, was the class of the field Friday night at Allegan High School.
Niles won three out of the four relays on its way to scoring 78 points. Vicksburg was second with 69 points, while West Division foe Lakeshore was third with 63.5 points.
West Division foes Dowagiac and St. Joseph finished tied for ninth with 24 points.
Dowagiac had one regional champion as Isaiah Jones won the long jump with a leap of 20-10.5.
Kyle Bennett was second in the pole vault with a personal best of 12-9.
The top two finishers in each event, plus those who qualify by time, distance of height, advance to the state finals June 4 at Caledonia High School.
Dowagiac's placer was the 400-meter relay team which ran a time of 45.2.
The Vikings won the 3,200-, 800- and 400-meter relays Friday night.
The 3,200-meter relay team of Logan Todd, Austin Neilson, Nicvolas Schuck and Dan Geiger posted a time of 8:15.67.
Niles ran 1:31.54 to win the 800-meter relay with the team of Quinten King, Craig Rumph, Otis West and Isaiah Glaze.
The unit of King, West, Robert Cinninger and Glaze won the 400-meters with a time of 43.8.
Niles also picked up regional championships in the 100-meters with Glaze, who ran 10.9 and West in the 200-meters. West was clocked at 22.3.
The Vikings earned one regional championship in the field events where Kurt Poehlman cleared 6-4.
By winning the regional meet, Niles now qualifies for the MITCA team state finals which will be held after the Michigan High School Athletic Association finals in June.
Niles did not have a regional champion in the girls' meet and none advanced to the state finals.
The Lady Vikings did get a third place finish from Chelsea Bennett in the discus where she finished with a distance of 106-7.
Samantha Brawley finished fourth in the 3,200-meters with a time of 12:25.9.
Ashley Austin was fifth in the shot put with a toss of 33-7.25. The Lady Vikings were also fifth in the 3,200-meter relay where it ran a time of 10:49.61.
The Vikings, Bears, Chieftains and Lancers will all return to the track on Wednesday when they head to St. Joseph to compete against the East and Central divisions in the Big 16 Conference track meet.
Field events begin at noon.