Crawfordsville track and field is still finding its way with its lineups in the early part of their 2023 season. That hasn’t stopped the Athenians, who are under the new direction of first-year coach Michael Jones, from seeing some early season success.
Thursday CHS hosted both Traders Point and North Putnam in a three team meet. The meet got roughly two-thirds of the way done before mother nature made her presence felt and caused the rest of the meet to be canceled due to lightning and incoming rain.
Jones has liked though how in the early part of the season how his team is coming together.
“We had a lot of our girls come back so we knew early on what we were getting out of them,” Jones said. “I knew they would put a lot in during practice and most of our times are right at or even slightly below where they where they ended last year. On the boys side we’re still young and a little inexperienced, but those guys have even surprised themselves a little bit with what they’re capable of. It’s nice that we’re starting to open their eyes to what their potential is.”
An area where the Athenians are very strong and rely a lot on is their distance runners on both sides. CHS cross country coach Megan Craig has built a tradition of success in the fall with her teams and that has carried over into the track and field seasons in the spring.
The boys team features the likes of Ryan Miller, Max Brumett, Tyson Fuller, Roman Contreras, and Hutton Haas along with Peter Kearns. The girls feature Sophia Melevage and also Katherine Novak, Skylah Strawser, and Olivia Biddle.
“I’ve never once questioned her judgment or abilities when it comes to that part of our program,” Jones said of Craig. “All of those runners are obviously really strong on both sides and they’ve been able to help us out in our 4x400 relay teams as well. She creates and builds the kind of kids that we need in our program and they have the speed to back it up on most nights.”
The season is still early for the Athenians and not everything is set in stone just yet. Not counting the canceled meet on Thursday the girls are 2-0 in their first couple of meets on the season while the boys are 1-1. Cville will be back in action on Monday when they host Fountain Central, North Montgomery, and Seeger.
“A lot of this early part of the season has just been getting some times on these kids and seeing where they’ll fit best,” Jones said. “With that we’re putting some people in a lot of different events just to see where they’re at. Doing that allows us to piece together the best lineup that we can so we can be the most successful.”
