Highland boys track team is full of depth

The Highland High School boys track and field team lost a collection of seniors last year that helped the program experience arguably the most successful season in school history, but veteran coach Bob Vance is optimistic the team has enough depth and depth this season to stack up well again.

“When you set seven school records, that doesn’t happen too often,” said Vance, whose team gets out of the chute to begin the outdoor season Thursday with the annual dual meet at Granite City. “We qualified in more events (nine) than we ever had before and scored more points than we ever had before. And they were some really good kids that we lost. Repeating what we did last year is going to be a real challenge. But these guys realize that we have done it, so we can do it again. We might be a team that can score more points at state this year than we did last year. But I always set the goals high.

“More and more of our teams are bringing home state hardware, like our girls basketball team and our baseball team, and it would be fun to get a track team trophy, too.”

WELCOME BACK STATE CHAMP

The biggest returner to the fold for the Bulldogs this spring is junior Tyler Higgins, who is the reigning Class 2A state champion in the 400-meter dash. He also holds the school record in all three of the sport’s fastest open sprint races, the 100, 200 and 400.

“Tyler Higgins is obviously rewriting our record book for the 100, 200 and 400,” Vance said. “He broke the record in all three oF them as a sophomore. He was a little frustrated in January and February, because his times were not where he wanted them to be, and he didn’t have what I like to call his ‘power surge.’ But last week (Saturday, March 5), we saw that he ran a 23-second 200 and a 52 in the 400. They were not close races, as he pulled away from the field. Actually, he told me after, ‘I could have run faster.’ ”

Vance said Higgins is a tough competitor and thrives on competition.

“When the competition gets better, we see him step to the forefront, and that’s great” Vance said.

TRIO OF KEY RETURNING SENIORS

In addition to Higgins, Highland has three seniors who will also help lead the team after having tasted success at state last year. The trio includes Hayden Smart, Brode Portell and Sam Teipe.

Smart, who is a four-year track member, and Portell, who came out for the first time as a junior and made an immediate impact, made up half of two state-qualifying relay teams (4 x 400 and 4 x 800), highlighted by helping the 4 x 800-meter relay quartet garner the program’s best relay team state finish with a fourth-place medal in Class 2A. Teipe is the lone returning member of last year’s two state-qualifying sprint relay teams (4 x 100 and 4 x 200), including helped the the 4 x 100 unit race to the seventh-place medal.

“We don’t have as many seniors as we did last year, and I believe you win with seniors. but we do have three seniors with state experience and have gotten the taste for it,” Vance said. “Hopefully, they’ll make that effort to step up and help us get some other units, whether it’s relay teams or individuals to qualify.”

Vance’s main goal is always to have each individual improve as much as possible in their respective event(s) throughout the season.

“We’re looking for personal bests. We talk about that every meet. Was it his season best? Was it his overall personal best? And then can they build upon it from there? Once they hit their personal best, then it’s trying to improve on that. And then maybe they start going for the school record, a state-qualifying mark, whatever it might be.”

The two additional seniors are Ziven Soyka, who hurdles, and Sam Ahlmeyer, who throws.

DEPTH A BIG PLUS

Despite boasting a small number of seniors, the Bulldogs do feature a lot of team depth with 46 total athletes in the program.

“The encouraging thing is that we are deep,” Vance said. “We have the most we’ve ever had since I have been here, and I have been the head coach for seven, eight years now. We’ve got really good numbers, just not a lot in the senior class. We’ve only got five seniors, but all three of the other classes have close to 15 members, which is real encouraging. And there’s a nice mix. We’ve got some distance runners, middle distance runners. We’ve got some sprinters, and we’ve got tome kids who are going to try some different field events.”

SPRINTERS AND HORIZONTAL JUMPERS

Higgins and Teipe are the team’s elite sprinters, whether in the open races or running legs of the 4 x 100 and 4 x 200 relay teams. In addition to Higgins and Teipe, other sprinters on the roster are sophomores Mason Geiger, the younger brother of Logan Geiger, Seby Wolf, Kyle Lane and freshman Sam LaPorta.

Teipe and Geiger will both also compete in the long and triple jumps. Other jumpers include junior Lucas Ammann, Wolf, sophomore Chase DeProw, and freshmen Sam Lutostanski and LaPorta.

Vance said LaPorta just came out for the team last week after basketball ended and he will use his 6-foot-2 athletic frame to help the team in some capacity, whether it be in the discus, hurdles, jumping events and/or running sprints.

“He is the prototypical decathlete type of athlete,” Vance said. “He is very physically mature for a freshman and has pretty good size.”

DISTANCE AND MIDDLE-DISTANCE RUNNERS

In the long-distance events, junior Jacob Plocher leads the way. He has already posted a 10:45 in the 3,200-meter run. Other quality distance runners are fellow juniors Brock and Brendan Schrage.

In addition to Smart and Portell, also looking good in the middle distances in the opening two weeks of practice were freshmen Isaac Jones, Joe Gallo and Ben Wille, junior Bryce Sexton, junior Evan Capelle and Brock Schrage.

HIGH JUMPERS AND HURDLERS

Vance said Capelle has been a real pleasant surprise in the early going after having already cleared 6-2 in the high jump. That is four inches higher than his previous best and already matches the career best of Grant Riggs, who is now competing as a freshman at McKendree University.

And Lutostanski has hit 5-6 twice right out of the chute.

In addition to Soyka, other hurdlers are LaPorta and Lutostanski in the 110 high hurdles, Sexton in the 300 low hurdles, and sophomore Noah Schmitt.

THROWERS AND POLE VAULTERS

In addition to Ahlmeyer and LaPorta in the discus, other throwers on the team are junior Jacob White, Lane and sophomores Chance Kurwicki, Dylan Rolfingsmeyer and Corey Michaels.

Wolf, Jones, Gallo and sophomore Deakon Thornton are the top candidates in the pole vault. Wolf and Jones have already cleared 10-0 in the event.

This story was originally published March 16, 2016 at 5:45 AM with the headline "Highland boys track team is full of depth."