A successful winter season concluded for the Saint Ignatius track and field team this weekend, ushering in what will hopefully be a prosperous spring for the men of head coach Chuck Kyle ’69.
The Wildcats earned fifth place out of the 72 teams at the OATCCC Indoor State Championships. A number of Wildcats posted banner performances in a meet signaling the start of spring.
As per usual, Phil Zuccaro anchored the Wildcats' effort. The senior snagged second in the 200m dash with a nice time of 21.89. Zuccaro also clocked a quick time of 6.96 in the 60m, just .07 off the winning time by Sylvania Northview's Darian Hooker.
The Wildcats took two other individuals to the finals – Nick Saul and Liam McGuire in the 1600m race (commonly known as the mile). Saul recorded a time of 4:20.82, good for seventh, while McGuire timed in at 4:23.50 for a 10th place finish.
"Nick did a wonderful job in the mile. That was a personal record for him by 5 seconds," said head coach Chuck Kyle '69. "He looked strong, so I think there's more to come for him. He's having a really good year. Liam was sick and out for a couple days this week, and he PR'ed for indoor."
In the relays, Matt Blouch, Joey Ripepi, Andrew Biehl, and Brett Saunders reached the finals for the 4x800m relay. The quartet combined for an 18th place finish with a time of 8:23.88.
The hurdles saw John Wetula and Max Pike compete for the Wildcats. Wetula repped the team in the finals, with a time of 8.36 in the 60m hurdles. Wetula's ninth-place finish did not score any points for the Wildcats, but it's still an impressive time.
"It's safe to say that we've never had a hurdler do that time in the 60m high hurdles. That's the best in school history that he ran there," Coach Kyle said.
In the shot put, Darian Kinnard has picked up where he left off last season. Kinnard posted a clutch performance to take second with a toss of 59-11.25.
"Darian really hit his last throw," Kyle said. "Heading into the last throw, he was fourth, and then he buried a 59-11. He came up big when he had to do so."
As a whole, the Wildcats' fifth-place mark indicates that the spring could be quite kind to Coach Kyle's team.
"Indoor track is a misnomer because we practice outside. We always take indoor as a building block and training, but to do that well, when we trained out in the snow, that's a good sign," Kyle said. "Now, track moves to our element – the outside. We're used to it, because that's where we practice."
The Wildcats' first spring meet of the year will occur on Saturday, March 24. The team will compete in the prestigious Strongsville Elite Meet, which gathers some of the best teams in Northeast Ohio.