FA boys win ‘B’ track state championship

BAR HARBOR — The Foxcroft Academy boys track team continued with its flair for the dramatic Saturday — and was rewarded with a state title. 

BDN photo/Pete Warner

THREE STATE HIGH JUMP CROWNS — Foxcroft Academy senior Hunter Smith cleared 6 feet, 2 inches at the Class B state championship on Saturday to win the title in the high jump, giving him three overall in his career after Smith won the event at the Class C finals in 2014 and 2015. On June 4 Smith also earned top honors in the 110 hurdles at 15.35 seconds and placed second in both the long and triple jumps to help the Ponies win the state championship.

Hunter Smith’s victory in the high jump with just one event remaining gave the Ponies the cushion they needed in outlasting York for the Class B championship at Mount Desert Island High School.

Coach Rob Weber’s Ponies tallied 71 points, edging the defending state champions (64) by simply finishing the 4×400 relay to secure the program’s second state title in outdoor track overall and first in Class B.

Foxcroft won the Class C state championship in 2013.

“We’ve had some great competition in Class C and to come up here and win it in Class B is pretty insane,” said Smith, whose team was reclassified to Class B by enrollment in outdoor track this year. “All these guys have worked super hard.”

York and Foxcroft — which finished 1-2 at the Class B indoor state meet last winter — were tied 60-60 before Smith won the high jump with a best of 6-2 and teammate Zach Caron added a seventh-place finish in the event at 5-08

That gave the Ponies a 71-62 lead — York’s Jake Martin finished sixth in the high jump — and while Foxcroft didn’t score in the final relay (3:43.53), the Wildcats’ sixth-place finish wasn’t enough to erase the deficit.

The victory came just one week after the Ponies’ outlasted Class A Brewer in the final event to win the Penobscot Valley Conference large-school championship.

“Last week was an emotional win for us and I was worried it would take a lot out of us,” said Weber.

Smith, who won four events at the PVC, also won the 110 hurdles at States in 15.35 seconds while adding second-place finishes in the long and triple jumps (20-11.25 and 41-03.5 respectively).

It was quite a conclusion to Smith’s senior year at Foxcroft, which began with a dislocated hip suffered during a preseason football game that sidelined him throughout the fall.

He came back in time to compete in basketball and indoor track during the winter as well as play in a national-level high school football all-star game in January before returning to outdoor track this spring.

“It’s a great way to finish it,” said Smith, who will attend the University of Maine this fall on a football scholarship.

Caron, a senior, added third-place finishes in the triple jump (41-03) and pole vault (12-00) to his point in the high jump, while classmate Nate Church was third in both the 100 and 200 dashes (11.42 and 23.20 seconds) and teamed with Evan Chadbourne, Blaine Robinson and Paul Birtwistle to finish fifth in the 4×100 relay (46.34 seconds).

Senior Cooper Nelson added key points in the distance events, placing fourth in the 1,600 (4:34.77) and sixth in the 800 (2:03.53), while senior Brandon Brock finished seventh in the shot put (41-03.75).

“As terrific as our top guys are, they guys that are grinding out those seconds and third really mattered a lot this year,” Weber said.

In the girls meet, Foxcroft junior Emily Mikoud was crowned state champion in the discus with a best of 118 feet, 9 inches.

Mikoud had finished second in that event at the PVC’s, but topped her best at that meet (112-8) by more than 6 feet at States.

Mikoud also placed fifth in the shot put at 34-2¼.