Championship Central

PITTSBURG, Kan. – A year removed from winning their first NJCAA Region 6 Indoor Track and Field team title in program history, the Hutchinson Community College men’s track and field team edged out Barton Community College to earn a second-consecutive NJCAA Region 6 Indoor Track Title to go back-to-back as Champions inside the Robert W. Plaster Center on the campus of Pittsburg State University in Pittsburg, Kansas.

In what ended up being a three-team battle atop the standings for hardware, the Blue Dragons needed all of their 122 points earned throughout the two-day meet to pick up the team title as Barton Community College was unable to close the gap in the final event of the weekend and the 4x400 meter relay as Hutchinson’s four-point lead entering the event was enough following a fourth-place event finish for Barton and sixth-place event finish for HCC to only move the Cougars two points closer. Finishing third and managing to eclipse the 100-point mark was Coffeyville, with the Red Ravens tallying 109 total points to finish ahead of fourth-place Butler (98 points) and fifth-place Cloud County (81.5 points).

Picking up 36 of their points in jumps and adding another 26 points in distance events, the Blue Dragons were able to put together a well-rounded effort as a team with each type of event scoring at least eight points towards the team total. The weekend started with 13.5 points being earned for the Blue Dragons in the pole vault after Gregory Martinez finished as region 6 runner-up and Wesley Gill tied for third, while seeing teammates Yassine Sassi (long jump) and Joshua Sweetnam (shot put) both pick up individual titles to get HCC out to a lead in the team scoring heading into day two. Adding a third region 6 individual champion on Sunday, Gill won the heptathlon in his first time competing in the event while setting a new NJCAA Region 6 Meet record in the process with a total of 5,039 points. Other key scoring events for HCC on Sunday included runner-up finishes from Kebba Makalo in the 60-meter dash (6.72 seconds) and 200 meters (20.91 seconds), while Ricard Peders was Region 6 runner-up in the 60-meter hurdles (8.22 seconds) and Jahmari Clifton earned region runner-up in the high jump (2.04 meters (6 ft. – 8.25 in.).   

In addition to Gill’s Region 6 meet record in the heptathlon, three other NJCAA Region 6 Men’s meet records were set throughout the weekend. Allen’s Ari Dargon eclipsed the previous 200-meter record of 20.89 seconds set by Eli Hall-Thompson (Butler) in 2016 by running a time of 20.88 seconds, while Cloud County’s Abdelaziz Benbrahim ran a time of 1:17.99 in the 600 meters to set a meet record and break the previous record of 1:18.34 set by John Matheri (Butler) in 1999. Just a year removed from setting a Region 6 meet record in the 4x400 meter relay, Coffeyville Community College once again set the new standard in the meet’s final event by running a time of 3:09.76 to take off nearly half a second from last year’s record time of 3:10.23 with Delvion Zanders, Randin Johnson, Usir Bey, and Latrell Johnson combining for the time.

Hutchinson also won the Kansas Jayhawk Community College Conference West Division team title by scoring 185.5 total points, putting a bit more separation between themselves and Barton who finished second with 162 total points. Cloud County finished third in the KJCCC West standings with 140.5 points, while Garden City was also able to break the 100-point mark in the division by scoring 117 points. In the KJCCC East Division, Region 6 third-place finishers Coffeyville ran away with the division crown by scoring 261 points to finish 100 points ahead of runners-up Butler (157 points), while Cowley (116 points) took third, followed by Neosho County (91 points) and Allen (73 points) to round out the top five.

Individuals from Barton Community College and Butler Community College managed to pick up all five post-meet awards, with Barton’s David Schenek and Emmanuel Dixon earning Region 6 Men’s Coach of the Year and Region 6 Men’s Assistant Coach of the Year honors, while Cougar athlete Chavez Penn was named Region 6 Field Athlete of the Meet. Butler picked up the remaining two awards, with Grizzly Itumeleng Ngxabazi earning Men’s Top Point Scorer of the Meet while Kamohelo Ramatsebe earned Men’s Track Athlete of the Meet.