The Eason Invitational has been the scene of down-to-the-wire finishes and ultimately narrow misses for the Shorewood girls track team.
Not this year.
The Thunderbirds finally snared the team title that eluded them the past two years at the 16th annual meet April 24 at Snohomish High School.
Shorewood placed third at Eason last year and in 2002 the T-birds came up a half-point shy of the team championship and settled for second.
“We went there to win. That was our mind-set,” Shorewood coach Cecil Jackson said. “There’s always good competition and great teams there. It felt good to finally bust through the door and get it done.”
Freshman Rachel Eckerlin chased down Seattle Christian’s Allison Ritchie to win the 3,200-meter run in a time of 11:15.00.
“She was boxed in at the start and was probably behind by 300 meters after the first lap,” Jackson said. “She spent the next seven reeling (Ritchie) in. She didn’t panic. It was her smartest race of the year.”
Eckerlin eventually pulled even with Ritchie on the final lap and charged ahead with about 200 meters to go.
“She’s such a competitor,” Jackson said. “All of the soccer girls we get have that toughness.”
Shorewood’s only other individual champion was sophomore Lauren Sego, who won the javelin by more than 5 feet with her toss of 132 feet, 3 inches.
Senior sprinter Akosua Fordjour placed second in the 200-meters in a time of 25.96 seconds and fourth in the 100 in 12.75 seconds.
Christa Brediger, Nicole Kopta, Katie Whittle and Fordjour clocked a season-best time of 1:46.8 in the 800 relay to finish third and Shorewood’s other two relay teams also took third.
Lily Albin placed sixth in the 800 in 2:24.21, Emily Handley took eighth in the 100 hurdles in 17.30 and Megan Sego was ninth in the triple jump with a leap of 32-7.
Shorewood compiled 59 team points to hold off Decatur and Snohomish, who tied for second with 48 points.
On the boys side, senior Kevin Klein recorded Shorewood’s top finish by placing fifth in the 1,600 in a personal-best time of 4:30.47.
“Looking at the Wesco South, that puts him in the top three or four,” Jackson said.
David Hancock finished seventh in the discus with a heave of 144-6 and Tyler Dobbs cleared 12-9 in the pole vault to tie for ninth.
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