Published: May 13, 2008 06:36 am         

Falcons fly high in WRC

North Vermillion wins 1,600 relay, meet title

COVINGTON, Ind. — North Vermillion senior Dennis Webb admitted that he had problems sleeping Wednesday night.

Webb said he kept waking up and thinking about Thursday’s Wabash River Conference track meet at the Trojans Sports Complex.

All day in school, he caught himself thinking about what it would take to bring the conference title back to North Vermillion.

When he stepped onto the track for the anchor leg of the 1,600-meter relay, the time for thinking was over. The conference title was going to come down to the final 400 meters.

Webb held off Seeger senior Mark Cravatt in the final 100 meters to give North Vermillion its first WRC title in three years, 125-123 over Seeger.

“I think about track all the time,’’ Webb said. “I woke up twice last night thinking about today, because I was so excited for it. We knew it would be close and all I could think about all day was this meet, including the 4-by-4.’’

Right before the runners took the track for the meet’s final event, the teams were informed that North Vermillion and Seeger were tied with 115 points each.

“It was stressful, it was definitely the most intense moment of the night,’’ said North Vermillion junior Quentin Bemis, who won the 110 and 300 hurdle events. “We knew Seeger had a very fast leg at the end with Cravatt.’’

When Webb took the baton, he was in second place behind Attica and Seeger’s Cravatt was more than 50 meters behind him.

“When I got the baton, I took off and caught the Attica runner,’’ Webb said. “When I did, I could hear Cravatt coming up behind me.’’

Cravatt, who won the 100 and 200 events, as well as anchoring Seeger’s winning 400 relay, caught Webb with about 150 meters left.

“Back in 2004, we were going to win the meet until the (Eli) Cook from Seeger caught us in the final 15 meters of the 4-by-4 relay,’’ North Vermillion coach Martin Brown said. “I was thinking, ‘oh no, not again.’

“But, having a seniors in that race, including Webb at the end made a big difference.’’

Joining Bemis and Webb on that relay are seniors Devin Morson and Zach Swartz.

“Every year, we set a goal of winning the conference title,’’ Webb said. “We won it our freshman year and we’ve been close the last two years.

“We knew it was all on the 4-by-4 relay team. We were ready for this race and ready to take this championship.’’

Earlier in the meet, Webb had a role in one of the closest finishes of the night in the 400.

He barely edged Attica’s LeStat Harp, winning the event by .04 of a second.

Actually neither runner knew which place they got until it was announced a few minutes after the race.

“That was another stressful few minutes tonight for me,’’ Webb said. “I thought I just barely got him, but no one at the finish line knew for sure.’’

In a meet decided by two points, that was an important win for North Vermillion.

But, Brown pointed out that his 400 relay team with the addition of Bemis probably provided a big difference in the meet.

“He sacrificed his 300 meter time to run in the 4-by-1 relay,’’ Brown said. “We went from being seeded fifth in that race to a second-place finish — that was the difference in the meet.’’

Bemis admitted he ran a very conservative race in winning the 300 hurdles, trying to conserve his energy for the relay.

The difference between fifth and second in Thursday’s meet was four points.

“On paper, we were going to lose by eight points before the meet,’’ Brown said. “I told all of the guys that we needed everyone to score at least one point. Everyone that ran tonight for us — scored at least one point.

“We didn’t get a lot of first places, but we won this with a team effort.’’

Joining Bemis and Webb with multiple titles for the Falcons was Swartz, who won the 800.

Seeger coach Jessica Hohimer said that Cravatt was phenomenal.

“You wonder what he could have done if had not ran five other races today,’’ she said. “But the whole team came up with a big performance, and they realized how important it was to win the conference title.

“We just came up a couple of points short.’’

Joining Cravatt on Seeger’s winning 400 relay was Brandon Hulsey, Jacob Cook and Ethan Cronk. Hulsey also won the long jump event.

Fountain Central was third in the meet and the Mustangs set a conference record in the 3,200 relay.

The team of Mark Beight, Scott Dailey, Adam Walters and Luke Throckmorton clocked in at 8 minutes, 41.55 seconds. Beight also added individual titles in the 1,600 and 3,200 runs.

Rounding out the conference results were Attica, Rockville, Covington and Riverton Parke.