MEET RESULTS
By ZACK CREGLOW
GALESBURG —
Stephanie Saey wastes little time making her presence felt.
In cross country last fall, the freshman became Galesburg High School’s top runner from the word, Go, eventually finishing seventh in the state. Little has changed since she began running track.
Saey made her debut in the 3200 meter run on Friday after sitting out the first weeks of the season over concerns due to her asthma and allergies. Nonetheless, she charged ahead of the pack at the GHS Invitational to capture the 3200 and help Galesburg dominate the 12-team field.
“It was my first time running it so I wanted to get 12 minutes or under,” said Saey, who also finished third in the 1600. “I’ve been out for three weeks before this because of my asthma and … allergies. This is only like my second meet back since then and my first one running this.”
Galesburg blew away second-place finisher Moline, one of the top contenders in the Western Big 6, by 64.5 points. Monmouth-Roseville, the smallest team in the field, finished ninth with 25 points overall.
The Silver Streaks finished in the top three in 14 of the invite’s 18 events.
“I really thought it would be pretty close between us and Richwoods and Moline and possibly Notre Dame because they looked really good on paper,” Galesburg Jody Chapman said. “So I tried to make it so we would score in some events that maybe we haven’t scored in.”
But, as usual, it was a double dose of Bailey Jackson and a dominating showing in the relay events that highlighted the effort for Galesburg.
Jackson, a state-championship-caliber jumper who has battled an ankle injury in the early season, finished first in the triple jump with a distance of 34 feet, 5.75 inches and won the long jump on a judges’ decision after tying with Peoria Richwoods’ Brenna Detra with a distance of 16-6.5.
“I am back at where I was before. All there is is to get better now. I am not hoping for too much right now because it’s still early April and I still have until the end of May to get to where I need to be,” Jackson said. “It’s fairly early in the season so I am not trippin’ really on where I am.”
Galesburg captured firsts in the 400, 800 and 3200 relays. Sprinter Cierra Latta took the other first-place finish for the Silver Streaks, edging Dashay Johnson of Richwoods in the 100 dash in a time of 12.6.
In the final event, the Monmouth-Roseville 1600 relay team of Alejandra Gillen, Amanda Schreck, Marcela Gillen and Rebecca Gillen snuck past the Silver Streaks and captured first in a time of 4:18.14. On the final leg, Rebecca Gillen shot past several runners to put the Titans in the first.
“The whole time I had them in my sight. The girls got me in good position,” she said. “Toward the end … I tried to get as close as I could and on the backstretch I just gunned for them.”
For Galesburg, the victory over Moline came one week after the Maroons defeated them in their own home invitational, the Shipley Invite. Moline was without perhaps its top performer this week, however, with sprinter/jumper Miranda Geever gone on vacation.
“It worked out well for us,” Chapman said of the absence. “They have more depth than we do so like in an A-B-C meet like that it helps them out and it hurts us because we don’t have quite the depth they do.”
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