By RAY BENTON
Leader sports editor
The Cabot Panthers’ boys’ track team earned a second-place finish in the Searcy Lion Relays on Thursday at Lion Stadium. Conway won the nine-team competition with 128 points while Cabot finished with 99. Russellville was third with 76.5 and Vilonia finished fourth 69.5.
Heber Springs and Jonesboro finished with 69 and 64 points respectively. Marion had 41, Beebe 24 and the host team finished last with nine total points.
In the girls’ competition, Cabot finished fifth and Beebe seventh. Conway dominated with 195 points to beat second-place Vilonia’s 117.5 by a wide margin. Russellville had 110 points and Jonesboro was a distant fourth with 58.5. Cabot had 45 points, Heber Springs 42, Beebe 18, Searcy 11 and Marion only two points.
The Panthers only won two events. Matt Stanley took first place in the high jump with a leap of 6-feet, 3-inches. He beat Jonesboro’s Jakaylen Jackson by two inches, and they were the only two competitors to clear six feet. Beebe’s K.J. O’Neill finished fifth.
The Panthers also won the 4x400-meter relay with a time of 3:37.50. The team of Trey Tonnessen, Austin Swackhammer, Brandon Whitley and Lyndon Nichols beat Conway by 1.61 seconds. Beebe finished sixth in the event.
Whitley took second in the triple jump and sixth in the long jump. Braxton Burton was second for the Panthers in the pole vault, clearing 12-feet. Vilonia’s Thomas Hutchison won with a 13-5. Beebe’s Isiah Hutson finished fifth at 10-6.
In the sprints, defending state champion Britton Alley finished second in the 200-meter dash. Alley is coming off an injury suffered in the state indoor meet in late January.
Conley Hillegas took second for the Panthers in the 400-meter dash, while Nichols was fifth and Beebe sophomore Taylor Boyce finished eighth.
The Panthers finished second in the 4x800 relay, finishing seven seconds behind Conway. Greyson Kaufman, Gardner Howze, Aiden Treherne and Stuart Nickell finished in 8:33.55. Beebe’s team of Logan Archer, Colin Brock, Gus McCoy and Dylan Owens was fourth in that event.
Howze and Treherne finished third and fourth in the 800-meter race, while Brock was seventh for Beebe.
Archer finished third in the 300-meter hurdles for the Badgers, while Cabot’s Connor Daigle and Tyler George were sixth and seventh in that event.
Chris Boles and George finished seventh and eighth respectively in the 110-meter hurdles.
Whitley and Alex Roberts were fourth and fifth in the 100-meter dash.
Nickell finished fourth in the 1,600 while Blake Scott took the same position in the 3,200. Beebe’s Gus McCoy was fifth in the 3,200 and Howze finished seventh in the 1,600-meter race.
In the girls’ competition, Cabot junior Casey Gore won the 1,600-meter race with a time of 5:33.99. She beat Conway’s Lauren Campbell by 8.57 seconds. Brayden Geisler added four more points for Cabot in that event by finishing fifth.
Gore and Geisler also helped Cabot win the 4x800 by a wide margin with a time of 10:20.25. Geisler, Lauren Turner, Gore and Hadley Dickinson finished almost 15 seconds ahead of Conway’s second-place team.
Turner and Tristyn Edgar finished third and fourth respectively in the 200-meter dash.
Shannon Gardner took fifth in the 800 for Cabot, and Erin Bowie finished sixth in the 3,200.
Marianna Richey had Beebe’s highest individual finish, taking second in the long jump with a leap of 14-9 3/4. Annmarie Covington finished fourth for the Lady Badgers in the 400-meter dash.
