Havre Track teams prepare for stretch run

As the end of the high school track season approaches, the Havre Blue Ponies have started to build some momentum and this weekend, they are hoping to keep that momentum going in a quadrangular against Lewistown, North Star and Malta.

Both HHS track teams, which are coming off strong performances in Whitefish and at the Glasgow Top 10 last Tuesday, are looking to close out the regular season on a strong note. Havre will compete in the quadrangular Saturday, starting at 11 a.m. After that, the next time the Ponies compete will be the Eastern A Divisional meet in Laurel May 20-21.

"I do feel like that, yeah," HHS head coach John Ita said about whether he felt his team was building momentum. "Our throwers have been struggling a little bit, but we have had some injuries there. Jordan Keith has been out and I don't know if we will get her back. So we have some injuries that are pretty troublesome. Amelia Beard, who is another consistent scorer, hurt herself and those injuries are pretty crucial to point-getting and they kind of hurt. Ethan Roberts has been hurt and so we really haven't put our speed relay together a whole lot yet and that's kind of scary going into the later stages of the season."

The meet, which was originally supposed to be just a triangular between Havre, Lewistown and Malta, added another team after a meet earlier in the season, was rained out.

"We added the extra team to go from three to four because we had that other meet washed out," Ita said. "So that will give the kids another chance to compete."

The Pony girls have done particularly well recently and they have done so with a mixture of youth and experience. They have also gotten a lot of points from sprinter Naomi Terry, who won both the 100-meter dash and the 200 at the Top 10 in Glasgow.

Terry isn't the only strong runner for the Havre girls, though. Rachel David (800) and Megan Erickson (1,600) have also been consistent point producers this season for the Ponies, just like Logan Huebsch and Ireland Coyne have been in the hurdles, and Loni Waid has been in the pole vault.

"I think if you look at our girls, if we can keep them together, there is some potential there," Ita said. "We put a lot of our girls in the JV event in Whitefish and we finished second. So the future is definitely bright."

The boys team has also been coming on strong and like the girls team, the strength lies with the runners. Michael Loftus placed in both the 100 and the 200 at the Top 10, while Nate Rismon finished second in the 200 and third in the pole vault. Luke Karnauskas is coming off a second-place showing in the 800 and a fifth-place finish in the high jump. Jacob LaBrie has also stood out in the 400 for HHS.

Others the Ponies will look to for points include thrower Thomas Keith, distance runner Austin Jones and pole vaulter Ivar Aageson.

"We are starting to get some people back healthy and that always helps, "Ita said. "We are looking really strong in the running events, we don't have a lot of point scorers in the field events, but that has also been in part because of some of the injuries we have faced in those events."

The quadrangular between Havre, North Star, Lewistown and Malta will get underway at 11 a.m. Saturday at the Havre Middle School track. Havre will then take a week off before competing at divisionals in Laurel May 20-21. The Class A state track meet will be May 27-28 in Bozeman.