Holden Boys Track And Field Team Captures Conference Crown
The Holden Eagles track and field team brought home the conference team title from the MRVC-East Meet at Carrollton High School Friday, Apr. 1.
In an Eagle team effort through a close competition to the very end in the team scores Holden totaled 119 team points versus Knob Noster’s second-place points total of 114, Higginsville’s third-place total of 111 points, and Richmond’s fourth-place total of 104. Lexington scored 77 points and Carrollton scored 56 to round out the conference meet with top-six individual finishes and top-five relay finishes scoring team points.
The MRVC-East team win marks the second for the Holden boys track and field program with the first title in program history being won during the 2023-24 season.
“It takes great performances by a lot of athletes to be able to win a conference, and I am extremely proud of the boys and how hard they work and how great they competed on Friday,” said Holden track and field head coach David Diener. “We had some people step up and steal some points that teams weren’t expecting us to get, and then the guys that we expected to put a top medal performance did for the most part. When those things happen, you have a chance to win a tough conference. It’s the second one in school history. These juniors and seniors have been big parts of both of them, and these underclassman have a chance to keep that championship expectation moving forward.”
Three Eagle athletes recorded individual conference titles in events at meet with Owen Doogs, Neil Tebbenkamp, and Dwight Meads collecting first-place finishes.
Doogs took his title finish in long jump with a first-place distance of 6.26m. The senior added a third-place medal finish in triple jump with a distance of 12.43m before taking to the track to contribute team points.
Tebbenkamp took the pole vault title by clearing 3.76m a week after tying the Holden school record in the event.
Meads gathered his conference title on the track by winning the 110m hurdles in a time of 17.29 seconds.
“It was extremely competitive meet and we knew we had some spots where we were going to get some conference champs with Dwight, Owen and Neil in their events, but we knew we had to get more third and fourth places finishes for points in order for us to compete for that top spot. That’s where our mid-distance and distance runners really stepped up for us, along with our sprints and sprint relays.”
All four of Holden’s relay teams placed in the top-three with three of those relays taking runner-up finishes.
In the first running event of the day, the Holden boys 4x800m relay team of Liam Claxton, Paxton Zeikle, Porter Eissler, and Evan Robinson placed second in a time of 9:33.
Holden’s 4x200m relay team of Brody Bockover, Lane Kendrick, Daniel Greathouse, and Seth Goodwin added a second-place relay showing by turning in a time of 1:37.
The Holden boys 4x100m relay team of Goodwin,
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