In the anchor event of the Conference 3A state track meet Thursday night in Austin, Mineola’s Morgan Waggoner took the baton in the 1,600-meter relay just trailing the Canadian runner and sprinted a strong anchor leg to bring home the gold medal.

Mineola helped set the pace throughout the four 400-meter legs, with the Yellowjackets in good position through the first two legs.

Canadian used the second exchange to grab the lead, but when Waggoner took the baton, he forged in front before the runners cleared the first curve and was never seriously threatened the rest of the way.

The finishing time of 3:22.42 shaved 2.34 seconds off the Yellowjackets’ regional time, which was best among the qualifiers. Canadian wound up in second, 1.36 seconds behind.

Brady Shrum, Jaxon Holland and TJ Moreland ran the opening legs, while Jamarcus Kennedy, the alternate, urged on his teammates.

Despite no teams with qualifying times under 3:24, the next three places all bettered that mark at state.

On the nerves of starting, Shrum said, "We're all just sitting there and it's hard not to jump and you get all riled up. But it was a great race."

Holland said he loves this race, "So I was ready to get it, take off, get us a lead and just work for my team."

Holland secured a lead for his team before the runners could leave their respective lanes and run on the inside of the track.

Moreland had to run "a steady race," run his race and give Waggoner a good chance to come out and win, "that's what it's about every meet."

Moreland stayed in touch with the Canadian runner and closed ground in his last few meters to give Mineola a chance.
Asked whether he'd ever run like that before, Waggoner replied, "Not that fast, not yet." Once he grabbed the lead, "it felt amazing, it's a great experience, especially seeing as it's my last high school race," it was a pretty good way to end it.

Earlier in the day, Mineola senior Abeni Kratzmeyer, the two-time defending champion in the pole vault (2018 and 2019), had to settle for the silver medal after it looked like the remaining two vaulters might have to tie or break the state record to win the event.

With Kratzmeyer and Joy Sherwood of Great Hearts Monte Vista the only ones left at 12’6”, Kratzmeyer easily cleared the height on her first attempt. Sherwood missed her first two tries but managed to advance on the third and final attempt.

That moved the bar to 12’9”, and this time Sherwood needed just one vault while Kratzmeyer missed on all three tries – a height she had cleared in earlier meets.

Sherwood’s three attempts at 13’1” to set a state conference record were not successful.

Quitman’s Brooklyn Marcee ran a personal best in the 300-meter hurdles, eclipsing her regional time by three-tenths of a second, running 46.77 to take eighth place among the nine runners.

The winning time was a blistering 42.95 seconds.