French Camp girls replaced Tupelo Christian as the queens of 1A track, dethroning the three-time defending champion in dominant fashion at the state track meet at Pearl High School. The Lady Panthers finished with 138 points to 95 for Tupelo Christian.
“I was very pleased with the team’s effort and how they performed,” said Coach Joe Watkins. “At the state championship level, it shouldn’t be easy, and it wasn’t. Our girls had to perform very well.”
French Camp took the lead in the first event as the quartet of Lucy Littlejohn, Ellen Ulerich, Averie Jane Gundy, and Taylor Benoit won the 3200-relay by nearly half a lap, and never relinquished it.
French Camp won points in 11 of the 18 events, including four firsts and five seconds.
Lucy Littlejohn, Ellen Ulerich, Averie Jane Gundy, and Taylor Benoit.
Benoit won the 400 and 800 and anchored the winning 3200-relay team. But her best race came in the 1600-relay, the only event she lost all season.
She was in third place, more than 40 yards behind, when she received the baton. At the wire, she was within three yards of Tupelo Christian's Anna Bishop Powell.
The theme of the meet for French Camp was exceeding expectations based upon seedings from qualifying performances at North State and South State meets.
In the 3200, eighth graders Littlejohn, Ulerich, and Olivia Gundy were seeded third, fourth and eighth. Each finished one spot higher.
Littlejohn and Ulerich ran together in third place through the first seven laps, trailing Abigail Craft of Tupelo Christian and Kylie Gray of Hickory Flat. Craft won the race, but Littlejohn and Ulerich surged past Gray on the final lap.
There was a similar story in the 300-hurdles. Maddi Davis was seeded fourth and Olivia Gundy sixth. Davis finished second and Gundy fourth.
Jasmine Bonty won the team's other gold medal in the shot put and was second in the discus, edged out by Kinsley Gordon of Myrtle by one inch. Her throw of 34-6¼ in the shot put exceeded her South State performance by more than four feet.
In the 1600, Averie Jane Gundy, Ulerich and Littlejohn were at the back of the pack, sixth, seventh and eighth, after one lap. But they moved up steadily to second, fourth and fifth.
Also for French Camp, Averie Jane Gundy and Littlejohn were third and fourth in the 800, Davis was fourth in the 100 hurdles, Lanie Green and Olivia Gundy fifth and sixth in the high jump and Olivia Surrette seventh in the discus.
There were three eighth graders, one freshman, two sophomores and three juniors, but no seniors, among French Camp’s nine athletes.
Boys
With only two competitors, the Panthers finished 15th with 17 points. Silas Hodge was second in the discus and fifth in the 800 and Jesse Jones finished fourth in the 1600. Both are freshmen.
Watkins expects to have greater participation next year with the addition of some younger kids to the team.
Tupelo Christian won a third consecutive boys championship.
