Photo by Jacob Musselman
Carmel has been the best team in Indiana all year long, and the Greyhounds proved it on Friday night by running away with the state championship, their fifth in school history and fourth since 2015.
Carmel took the points lead from Warren Central when Senior Owen Schafer won the 400-meter dash, and they never looked back. Kole Mathison and Jake Fisher finished second and third in the 3200-meter run to truly put it away, and Carmel showed their authority by winning the 4x400-meter relay to close out the night. The relays were some of Carmel's best events on Friday night, as they won the 4x400, finished 2nd in the 4x800, and third in the 4x100.
Brownsburg finished second on the night, primarily due to the efforts of John Colquitt. Colquitt won both the 110-meter hurdles and the 300-meter hurdles, and he finished fourth in the long jump.
Tucker Smith of Columbus North set a new state record in the shot put with a 67-11.25. The previous record was a 66-8.5 set by Jeremy Allen in 1997.
Another athlete that came into this meet eyeing a state record was high jumper Kamyren Garrett. The Lawrence Central Senior cleared 7-0 to claim the state title, and with a crowd of more than 4500 cheering him on, he elected to have the bar set at 7-4.25, just higher than the state meet record set by Nate Patterson in 2018. In the end, Garrett came up just short, ending a stellar high school career.
An athlete that may have done the most for himself is Ezra Lewellen. The Senior out of Pioneer only had the 11th best seed time, and just getting to the finals of the 100-meter dash was a win. Lewellen found another gear in the finals, and took the win in an incredibly close race, beating Michigan City's Esau Haynes by 0.004 seconds.
"Getting to state, that was my goal, then it was getting to finals, that's all I wanted. I was happy with that." Lewellen said "I knew I was going to have to get out of the blocks fast and then keep up my top speed, and that's what I did."
Another big upset came in the 800-meter run. William Neubauer of South Bend Adams came into this meet with the 12th best seed time, a 1:55.94. The Senior Eagle dropped two seconds off that time to take the state championship in 1:53.91.
"I really wanted to win this race." said Neubauer "I've been thinking about it for the last week, ever since my coaches here at Adams told me I had the potential to win that's just been running through my mind these last few days"
After a great night of track at the Boys State Finals, we look forward to another full night of action as the girls take to the track Saturday night.