Lady Mounts Clinch Section 2 Title

Ephrata’s Alyssa Fedorshak found another gear in the final lap of the 3,200-meter run with a pair of Elizabethtown girls ahead of her and a pair of candy bars waiting for her at the finish line, as the race and the Lancaster-Lebanon League Section Two title tilt between the two undefeated teams came down to the wire.

“I locked on the girl in front of me,” Fedorshak said, “and was, like, ‘I want this section title more than them. I want it more.’ And I fought for it as hard as I could. Everything in my legs were pulling and stretching. I didn’t even care. I just wanted to do it for my team.”

Fedorshak passed Elizabethtown’s Cat Shontz with about 170 meters to go. She surged past the Bears’ Madeline Quinn, a fellow freshman, with about 100 meters left. And she shattered her personal-best time by more than 30 seconds to win the race in 11:45.1 and spark Ephrata to an 80-70 win.

In the boys meet, Ephrata claimed its sixth win in a row with a 93.555.5 decision.

“We counted, this year, on an awful lot of freshmen from the very beginning,” said John Keller, Ephrata’s head coach, whose girls collected their sixth section title in seven years. “To see these freshmen grow up and contribute the way they have ... they’ve all, in their own right, been our freshman of the year.”

Young helps turn tide

Ephrata’s Jennie Young had contributed to a section title during her own freshman season. As a senior, she led the charge Monday, winning the 100-meter dash (12.3 seconds) and the 200-meter dash (26.2). She also ran the third leg of Ephrata’s winning 4x100-meter relay (51.8) and led off the winning 4x400-meter relay (4:07.8) after taxing runs in the Blue Streak Relays two days earlier at Manheim Township.

“My legs were tired,” Young said of going into the 4x400-meter relay. “I knew that (Elizabethtown’s) Katie Locker was going to run at the end, so I just wanted to run as fast as I could and get as big of a lead and as far ahead as I could for my three teammates.”

Young opened up a lead for the Mountaineers (7-0) with a split time of 60.9 seconds. Mary Campbell and a pair of freshmen in Baileigh Andrews and Madison Martin punctuated the win.

“She’s a rock,” Keller said of Young, “and for her to end her high school career with this, that means more to me than anything.”

Early E-town surge

Earlier in the meet, before Young and Martin charged to a one-two finish in the 100-meter dash, the Bears (6-1) roared out of the proverbial gates.

Malayna Van Winkle, Quinn, Shontz and Locker authored a come-from-behind win in the 4x800-meter relay (9:54.4), and Alicia Underkoffler won a tight 100-meter hurdles race (16.7), powering through the finish line just ahead of Ephrata freshman Talia Sheaffer.

Underkoffler also won the 300-meter intermediate hurdles race (48.2) while Locker won the 400-meter dash (58.4) and 800-meter run (2:33.3), and Shontz took the 1,600-meter run (5:23.4).

“On the track,” said Elizabethtown coach Derrick McDonald, “they were killing it.”

Field strength

Kara Bachert also gave the Bears a boost in the field, winning the long jump (16 feet, 2 inches) and triple jump (344.25) with season-best marks to complement a win in the high jump (410).

“I think it was just knowing that this was for the section,” Bachert said of her effort, still trying to catch her breath from running between the events at opposite ends of the facility. “We’ve never been this close before, and it was right there.”

But the Mountaineers compiled their requisite points in the field. Faith Hershberger hung with Bachert to take second-place points in the long jump (16-0) and the triple jump (34-1.75), and Ephrata’s throwing trio of Jenna Raezer, Alexus Clayton and Kandice Liebl won the shot put (35-9.75), the discus (109-6) and the javelin (111-10), respectively.

“It’s been really amazing,” said Raezer, a senior in her second year of throwing. “We all kind of have our niche, and we’re all just really competitive. We want to score points for our team.”

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