Bangor boys, girls capture crowns Depth sparks Rams in Black Bear Relays; Eastman breaks his record

ORONO – Sometimes, relay meets can be a welcome change from a typical high school track and field meet.

Most of the Eastern Maine Indoor Track League athletes who competed in Friday’s Black Bear Relays at the UMaine field house welcomed this change.

“We can really compete with everybody in the league and see all the teams,” said Brewer senior Sarah Hodgins after leading the Witches to victory in the shot-put relay, along with Kelsey Gagnon and Kelly Clark.

The Bangor boys and girls used their strong depth to capture the team titles.

The girls meet was never really in doubt from the start while the boys was a fight to the finish.

In the meet’s second event, the open 60-yard dash, the Bangor girls rolled up 21 points (places 1-3-4-6) to put it away early. The Rams finished with 132 points to runner-up Old Town’s 59.5. Mount Desert Island was third with 58, Hampden fourth with 49 and John Bapst of Bangor scored 42 to take fifth.

Bangor would protect and pad their cushion throughout the evening with Kaitlin Dirrig, Kelley Kraph, Jolene Belanger and Kelly Schenck all playing key roles.

With Bangor’s big team (the Rams have about 90 athletes, boys and girls) it can be difficult to seed competitors in different races, but veteran Bangor coach Maynard Walton has it down to a science.

“It’s very hard to make sure that someone has something to do,” he said. “It’s very hard seeding it. Once we have an organizational meeting, we can do it. If you don’t do that, it’s chaos.”

Walton’s girls team, the defending EM champions and heavy favorites to repeat, used their depth to dissect their way through the meet.

“We made some progress tonight,” he said. “We’re emphasizing the long jump, triple jump, pole vault, shot put and high jump. That’s where we’re weak. We had two girls go over 7 feet (in pole vault). We’re satisfied.”

Dirrig, a senior, ran the third leg on the short-sprint medley (400-200-200-400) team in addition to winning the 60 convincingly in 7.82 seconds. According to Walton, she is now unbeaten in EMITL meets through three-plus seasons.

“She knew she had to run tonight, because the girl from Penquis (Erin Beasley) is excellent,” he said.

The Bangor boys, who like the girls, are returning most of their team from a year ago.

“We’re doing better than I thought we would do tonight,” Walton said. “It’s going to come right down to the wire with Hampden, so we made some progress.”

In a boys meet that was fought to the final event, the larger Rams had too much for the Indians and Broncos, winning by a 117-100.5 score over runner-up Old Town. HA (82), Brewer (42) and Orono (36) rounded out the top five.

The Rams’ points came in many different ways, including a 5-6 effort from Matt Schencks and Ben Weissmann in the hurdles, Matt Goddell earned sixth in the mile, and Kole McBrearity placed sixth in the 60.

Bangor’s key standout was distance man Casey Quagilia, who was on three relay teams and won the mile, holding off Brewer’s Brendan Carr to win in 4 minutes, 39.32 seconds.

“He’s got so much energy,” Walton said. “Last time, Carr played him. Tonight, he basically played Carr and ran a better race tonight.”

Quagilia was a true warrior on this night, as he ran in four different races, the most an athlete can run in this meet. The last, the 4×400 relay, proved to be the toughest as he ousted an Old Town runner to seal the win for the Rams.

“It was a full team effort. It was amazing,” said an exhausted Quagilia. “I don’t know why I’m standing up right now. I have so much adrenaline running through me.”

Quagilia’s win in the mile got the Rams off on the right foot. He let Brewer’s Carr dictate the pace early, then pulled away in the final 440 yards.

“I had a better kick than him [Carr] this time,” he said.

Quagilia also ran the 800 leg on the short-sprint medley which finished third, along with Anthony Martinez, Ben Ludwig and Bryan Young, as well as the 4×800. His Rams now feel confident heading into the big meets.

“We’ve got so much momentum now. We feel that we can win PVC’s,” said Quagilia.

John Bapst of Bangor’s Evelyn Sharkey took the girls’ mile in 5:11.27. The boys’ 60 went to Hampden senior Tranior Kapler in 6.91. Old Town senior Tyler Eastman set his third league record in the shot put in as many meets with 53-foot throw.