The Marian Central Catholic girls track and field team enters the season with a large, albeit young, team. With 24 on the roster, but only four upperclassmen, it would appear the Hurricanes might have a challenge in front of them. However, head coach Jon Lakemacher said he sees a lot of potential.
“We have a lot of incoming freshmen and sophomores,” Lakemacher said. “We are a very young team, but there is a lot of talent there.”
The strength for the Lady ’Canes will be mid-distance and distance running.
“We should be strong at mid-distance and distance events,” Lakemacher said. “Cas Creighton did a good job of preparing the girls in the cross country season. We definitely have a lot of talent in the distance runners …. We have a lot of depth.”
The depth includes the Baumert sisters, Bria (sophomore) and Emma (freshman), who were both on the cross country team.
“They are very talented,” Lakemacher said. “They’ll bring some good things to the team.”
The team does not have a pole vaulter, and Lakemacher said it will be difficult to lose those points every match, but he is impressed with the high jump from freshman Therese Hughes and triple jump from freshman Catherine Meyn.
Unlike the cross country team, the Lady ’Canes are staying in Class 2A, and Lakemacher said the sectional meet will be challenging, but he sees the team having success.
“I think we are going to be pretty competitive in conference,” Lakemacher said. “We should get quite a few medals off of distance events, and I think with continued hard work and, if we stay injury free, at the sectional meet we should have a couple of relay teams in the mix for going down state.”
Bria Baumert, who will compete in the 400-meter dash, 4×400-relay and 4×100-relay, said she is very happy with where the team is compared to last year.
“I feel real good about our team,” Baumert said. “We’re definitely improved from last year. We have a different confidence level. We’re more like a team…. As a team, we want to do better than last year and keep improving.”
Lakemacher said he believes the team’s biggest challenges will be against defending conference champion Rosary High School Monday, April 6. The Suburban Christian Conference Meet will be Thursday, May 3, at Marmion Academy.
Team captains for the Lady ’Canes are seniors Lauren Buettner and Christina Mosnick and sophomore Candace Scurto.
The rest of the roster includes juniors Heather Bilecki and Brooke Neumann; sophomores Jessica Biggins, Toni Calderaro, Caroline Hellman, Justinne Ignacio and Lori Lowenheim; and freshmen Molly Dougherty, Danielle Flynn, Angela Isley, Anna Herff, Hannah Hoffmann, Ariel Majewski, Eimile Malmgren, Marisa Monbrod, Haley Neumann, Shea Pivnicka and Mia Sciarrone.