RHS Girls Track Wins with Victory in Relay

The Revere High girls indoor track team held off Lynn Classical in the final event, the 4 x 400 relay, to take a 48-38 victory in their season opener last week.

The Lady Patriots held a 43-38 advantage coming into the relay, a five point, winner take all event, which meant that a victory by Classical would have deadlocked the meet at 43-43.

However, the RHS quartet of Camden Sigouin,  Ha Nguyen, Amel Derras-Chouk, and  Chelsea Amaya prevailed by a slim margin of two seconds,  4:50.6-4:52.7.

“Going into the relay, we knew we needed at least a 7-10 second lead on Classical before their anchor leg,” said RHS head coach Samnang Ros. “Their anchor runner is probably the best sprinter in the conference.”

After Sigouin led off and kept Revere just a second behind, Nguyen took the baton and closed the gap.  With about 50 meters to go in the second leg, the LC runner suffered tightening and fatigue and  Ha took control and gave Revere a big lead at the exchange.

Amel and Chelsea then held on just enough to win the race and clinch the meet.

In the individual events, first place winners were Briana Scata in the shotput with a toss of 28-6.75; Lindsay Gurska in the 55 meter hurdles in 10.3; Brittany Brown in the 600 in 2:04; Kassandra Digitale in the mile in 6:31.9; and Nikki Nelson in the two mile in 14:28.

Adding three points with second place finishes were Sara Boukdad in the 55 meter hurdles in 10.6; Sigouin in the 55 meter dash in 7.9; Alanna Pasco in the 600 in 2:08; and Maggie DiPlatzi in the mile in 6:49.

Scoring valuable points, especially in a tight meet, with third place efforts, were Sigouin in the high jump with a leap of 4-2; Noelle Galli with a shotput throw of 23-4.25; Comfort Toglan in the 300 meters in 49.5; Janel Sasso to complete the sweep in the 600 in 2:12;   Lindsay Toglan in the 1000 in 4:08.6; and Stephanie Gregorio in the two mile in 15:24.

“It was nice to get a win out of the way early,” aid Ros. “This definitely is a rebuilding year for us.  We graduated a lot of seniors last year who scored in every single meet.  There were meets last year that we could pencil in the ‘W’ because of the quality girls we had.  Combine the loss of our top girls with the realignment of the conference putting us in a tougher division, wins might be hard to come by this year.

“But our captains, Sara Boukdad, Emily Deveau, Kassandra Digitale, Jessica Loeser, Briana Scata, and Camden Sigouin, will be hard on the girls to perform their best,” added the coach. “Losing our top girls is not an excuse to sit back.  Instead, it is a chance for the other girls to step up to the challenge.  Our team is full of freshmen and sophomores this year, some of whom are being thrown right into the fire.

“Our returning sophomores with varsity experience are Lindsay Gurska in the hurdles and Noelle Galli in the shot put,” Ros continued.  “Lindsay returns as our number one hurdler and is picking up where she left off last season.  We also have a couple of promising freshmen with Comfort Toglan and Noelle MacDonald in the sprints and Nikki Nelson in the distance events.  We may not be as strong as years’ past, but we will do our best to give the conference all we have.”

The girls host Danvers tonight (Wed.) at 7:00 and will meet Winthrop next Tuesday during the holiday break.