OA Boys' Track Beats Sharon, Clinches Davenport Division Championship

On a cold, damp day Tuesday afternoon at Muscato Stadium, the Oliver Ames boys’ track team fulfilled one of its goals after its 94-42 triumph over Sharon – winning the Davenport Division championship for spring track.

“It was nice to win the first ever Davenport Division championship for the spring,” coach Jake Sunderland said about the accomplishment. “We wanted to live up to what the winter team did indoors and we were very successful with that.”

While the conditions outside made it difficult to set personal records on Tuesday, this meet was more about making sure they focus on the task in hand.

“We got a big meet out of the boys and a lot of good performances on a fairly bad day as far as weather goes,” said Sunderland. “We told our guys not to focus so much on times and distances and just to focus on points and they seemed to do pretty well at that.”

Individually, OA was led by McKenzie Copley’s first place finishes in the 400-meter hurdles (with a time 60.3 seconds) and high-jump (clearing 5 feet-6 inches) and Jon Raduazzo’s first place performance in the 200 (23.4 seconds) and 400 meters (50 seconds). Matt Howard (100 meter) Andrew Kerester (one-mile), Britton Copley (800 meters), Drew Beck (two-mile), Billy Hamilton (shot put) and Nate Meyer (javelin) also put in first place finishes.

Despite the loss, Sharon’s Xander Bennett in the 100 meter hurdles (16.6 seconds), David Dones in the discuss (106 feet-8 inches) and Connor Hitchens in the long jump (19 feet-5 inches) and triple jump (41 feet – 8 inches) finished first in their respective events.

OA improved to 6-1 in its last dual meet of the year, while tallying a perfect 4-0 mark in the small division. Sharon dropped to 0-4 with the loss. Both teams will be represented at the Hockomock Championships in Mansfield beginning this coming Tuesday with the field events and concluding with the running portion next Thursday.

With one accomplishment already down, Sunderland is eager to see how his team shapes up with the best of the Hockomock League, especially those from the Rex-Kelley division.

“There’s some very good schools on the big side [of the Hock]. We ran into one of them in North Attleboro already,” he said. “We should fare pretty well, as we usually do. And we’re looking to see where we compare to some of the bigger teams.”