Long Beach Post Sports | LBPOSTSports.com | Poly Girls Win Historic Track State Championship (With Millikan, Wilson Results)

Sunday, June 7^th, 2009

Poly Girls Win Historic Track State Championship (With Millikan, Wilson Results)

Story by Mike Guardabascio

Don’t call it a dynasty: call it habit. For the second straight year and an historic tenth time overall, the Long Beach Poly girls’ track program has won the CIF California State Championship, in a performance as dominant as it was unsurprising, taking the title with 45 total points; their closest competitor, Serra, had just 28 points. By comparison, no boys’ program managed to accrue more than twenty points, as a four-way tie ensued at that mark. All of Poly's title wins have come in the last 18 years, and the tenth one served to lap the competition--the next-highest total for state titles is five.

The win came despite the Trackrabbits losing two of the events they were expected to win. The sensational sophomore Akawkaw Ndipagbor lost the 400-meter dash, an event in which she finds herself among the nation’s elite; on Saturday, she fell to Turquoise Thompson of Serra by an excruciating two-hundredths of a second, running the still-amazing time of 53.12. Serra also edged Poly in the 4X400, the day’s final run, by almost three seconds, posting a 3:42.91 to Poly’s 3:45.73. Serra’s time was a full seven seconds faster than their qualifier on Friday.

In fact, Poly only won one event all day, the 4X100 relay, as the three-sophomore team of Carisma Lyday, Melia Cox, Destiny Gammage and Ndipagbor edged Serra 45.88 to 45.96. Other than that, it was just a solid team performance, with Poly competitors racking up mid-level points in a number of events including the 800 meter (Neausha Logan took fourth), the 100-meter hurdles (Cox took sixth), the high jump (Tara Richmond took second with 5’8” and Alexus Dalton took seventh), and the triple jump (Cox took third and Richmond took seventh).

As impressive as that team performance seems, consider this: after their historic championship, the Poly girls’ team will be graduating exactly one athlete (Gammage), and will be keeping much of their top talent for another two seasons. Ndipagbor, Dynasty Gammage, Cox, Lyday, and Dalton are all sophomores. Their tenth state championship is a momentous accomplishment—but don’t be surprised if it happens against next year.

Other Moore League results

The Poly boys’ team of Javon May, Kire Jibril, Cameron White, and Kaelin Clay took second in the 4X100, losing to Serra by .08 seconds.

Millikan

It was a tough day for the Rams, as Millikan’s competitors finished below their qualifying place in every event. In the 800-meter, junior Paisley Pettway took third with a time of 2:08.57 (she qualified second); Jonathan Sander had qualified second in the 300-meter hurdles but finished last with a time of 40.51, almost three seconds slower than his qualifying time. The Rams had qualified first in the boys’ 4X400 relay, but slipped into second, running a 3:14.64, nine-hundredths of a second behind O. Lu.

Wilson

Nyjah Cousar, senior, qualified third in the 300-meter hurdles, and ran a little better, finishing second with a time of 41.70. The Bruins took eighth in the girls’ 4X100 relay with Alycia Presley, Cousar, Fabrina Espinoza, and Christina Smith running in the cardinal and gold. Espinoza, a junior, also took seventh in the long jump.

Pictures coming Sunday night!

Mike Guardabascio is a freelance writer (ie, poor), CSULB grad (go Beach!), and a Long Beach native (ie, lucky). He played AYSO soccer, YMCA basketball, and pickup games of everything else, in every park from Cherry to El Dorado. He loves what he does.