Boys Track: Wheaton North dominates DuPage Valley meet
Updated: May 12, 2012 4:31PM
Wheaton North stole the show at Friday’s DuPage Valley Conference track meet at Naperville North.
The Falcons won five individual championships and two relays on their way to taking first place with 175 points. Wheaton North had more than twice as many points as second-place Wheaton Warrenville South (81).
Naperville Central finished in third place with 78 points while Naperville North was fifth with 65.
The Redhawks had two individual champions — Mike Juretschke in the pole vault and Sam Bransby in the 400.
Juretschke, a senior, won his first DVC title by setting a personal record in the pole vault (14-3).
“It feels great to win conference, especially because I’ve been jumping all four years,” Juretschke said. “It was a really big goal of mine to improve as much as I could this year.”
Bransby, a sophomore, defended his DVC indoor championship in the 400 (50.09) and finished third in the 200 (22.10).
“Indoor is a completely different monster, everyone gets faster outdoors,” Bransby said. “You feel like you have to step it up with everyone else, and I was proud to do that today.”
The Redhawks’ 3,200 team of Ethan Brodeur, Christian Schafer, Brad Kouchoukos and Forrest Thayer placed second (8:01.56).
Hurdler Michael Jopes placed third in both the 110 and 300 races. Central also got a third place finish from shot putter David Goodalis.
Fifth-place Naperville North was paced by sprinter James Kerns. The senior finished first in a very competitive 100 with a time of 10.86. Kerns also took second place in the 200 (22.08) and ran the opening leg of the Huskies’ third-place 4 by 200 relay.
Kerns had his mind set on next week’s sectional as soon as the DVC meet ended.
“This is the last meet before we go to sectionals, so the goal right now is to make sure you have the right time,” said Kerns, whose 100 and 200 times on Friday were below the state qualifying standards. “Winning conference is nice, but as long as I have the time I need to make state, that’s the primary goal.”
The Huskies got third place finishes from Nick Lyon (pole vault), Kareem Midani (long jump), Nick Drendel (3,200), Adam Milsap (400) and Jimmy Qiao (1,600).
Wheaton North could not be stopped on Friday. The Falcons won seven total events and had two athletes place in nine of the 13 individual events (100, 400, 1,600, 110 hurdles, 300 hurdles, pole vault, triple jump, shot put and discus).
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