Wednesday, March 26, 2008

Eagle boys win meet, BHS girls are second

Los Lunas boys second at Belen meet Durbin, Barba grab state qualifictaions, Quadrangular next

Jason W. Brooks News-Bulletin Staff Writer; jbrooks@news-bulletin.com

Belen State qualifying isn't the only stated goal of Belen track and field athletes, but the Eagles made some headway in that direction last Friday.

As the host team of the Jim Burke Invitational, the Eagles got their first wholesale batch of state qualifiers of the season after getting only one, Josh Garcia in the 1600 meters, at their first two meets. Three individuals and the boys 4-by-400 relay team all are now qualified to compete at the Class 4A state meet in May, with about seven more weeks left to improve those marks and qualify in other events.

The Eagle boys captured the team points title, beating county rival Los Lunas 110-97, while the Lady Eagles were second to Class 5A LLHS, 161.43 to 105.86. The 4A Valencia High School boys scored 12 points to place ninth among 13 teams.

"We exceeded how well I thought we were going to do," said BHS coach Jim Edwards of his team's performance. "Physically we were ready, I just didn't know if we were mentally ready to do this well."

For the Belen boys, probably the least surprising performance was that of Ethan Durbin, who qualified in the 800 meters for the second straight year. He won both events and ran the second leg of the first-place 4-by-400 relay team that qualified.

Durbin also ran on the 4-by-100 relay team along with freshman Dylan Barba, who was unknown to some Belen fans until this year. After seeing limited action on the Eagle varsity football team, Barba got his first big chance to shine on the Belen track Friday, and he handily won the 200 meters with a state-qualifying mark of 22.55 seconds.

The freshman, younger brother of fellow sprinter and football standout Justin Barba, also thrilled the crowd with a neck-and-neck race in the 100 meters alongside Los Lunas senior Matt Billups. Barba ran an 11.14 in the event and was edged by Billups' 11.00 seconds, but neither qualified for state.

Valencia's boys performance was highlighted by a second-place showing among the 17 entries in the medley relay. The 4A Jaguar squad beat Los Lunas and four different BHS teams.

The meet began at 9 a.m. and didn't end until nearly 8 p.m., and had relatively warm, calm weather throughout.

The Lady Eagles' performance was highlighted by Kelli Williams, a sophomore hurdler who qualified for state for the third straight year. Williams, perhaps pushed by talented Los Lunas counterpart Lesly Torres, beat Torres for first place in the event and qualified for state in 4A with a time of 16.42 seconds. The two were the top competitors in the 300-meter hurdles as well, with Torres beating Williams for first in that event.

Brittany Meister was third in the 100 hurdles; no other Belen girl besides Williams took first or second in any event, but the Lady Eagles were consistently one of the 12 girls teams included in the top eight in each event.

Amanda Baca was third in the 100 meters, Katie Roberts was third in the pole vault, and Desirae Saiz was third in the javelin for the Lady Eagles. Meister and Baca teamed with Sarah Thompson and Brittany Ortega on the third-place 4-by-100 relay team.

The Valencia girls team competed in several events, but didn't score.

BHS was state-qualified missing midlle-distance runner Josh Garcia and a few other athletes due to Good Friday activities, and the Lady Eagles have temporarily lost their best distance runner, Aleona Reyes, due to a head injury suffered in a P.E. class.

The Eagle teams are in action this week despite it being spring break, hosting the Belen Quadrangular on Friday at 3 p.m. There were five teams at last year's "quintangular," and there might be no geometric term to describe this year's field. St. Michael's, Ruidoso, Cuba, Tohatchi and Cuba are among the schools that have contacted Edwards about possibly attending.

"This is the end of the sixth week of training," said Edwards regarding the Eagles. "So the kids are four weeks removed from the valley I put them in at the beginning. Their bodies are starting to respond to the training. If we do all the little things, then we've seen here today what can come to fruition."

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