Greenwich High School girls indoor track golden, boys team 3rd at FCIACs

Written by Paul Silverfarb
Thursday, 09 February 2012 02:06

Throughout the indoor track season, the Greenwich High School boys and girls team has been hard at work, knowing that good things could happen.

That was exactly the case Thursday evening at the New Haven Athletic Complex during the Fairfield County Interscholastic Athletic Conference championship meet.

“This was a long time coming and long overdue for Greenwich track,” Greenwich head coach Evan Dubin said. “I can’t describe how happy I am for the team and how everything came together today.”

The Greenwich girls team had a meet to remember, as the entire roster pitched in to give Big Red the FCIAC championship, scoring 92 points. In fact, the next closest team was Darien High School, which placed second with 74 points. Danbury placed third with 49 points.

On the boys side, Greenwich was looking for a top five performance and instead of settling for fifth, finished comfortably in third place with 52 points. New Canaan was behind the Cardinals with 43 points. Staples won the meet with 107 points and Danbury placed second with 70 points.

“I told the team before to let the coaches worry about the big picture and just do your job,” Dubin said. “I wanted them to focus on doing the best they could do in their race. I couldn’t have asked for a better performance from both of my teams tonight.”

For the girls team, Greenwich was led by the dominating performance of Abby Markowitz.

“Abby deserves the medal of honor tonight,” Dubin said. “We needed her to do what she did today. To do the 1,000, 1,600 and 3,200 and won all convincingly was amazing. She deserves all the praise coming her way.”

The GHS senior finished the evening with three individual gold medals.

“I definitely wasn’t expecting to get first in all three events,” Markowitz said. “I knew it was going to be a really good challenge for me. I wasn’t very confident running the two-mile event, as it was only my second time running it. Knowing my team needed the points, I wanted to do my best.”

In the 1,000-meter run, Markowitz grabbed gold with a time of 3:00.36. Competing in the 1,600-meter run, Markowitz grabbed the top spot with a time of 5:19.71. She finished the day blasting ahead of her competition during the final lap of the 3,200-meter run and took top honors with a time of 11:35.65.

Big Red also had a plethora of finishers that grabbed FCIAC gold.

In the 300-meter run, Amanda Michaud crossed the finish line with a time of 42.77 seconds.

The foursome of Michaud, Emily Johnson, Naomi Leeds and Claire D’Etiveaud started the meet off with a commanding victory in the 4x200-meter run, finishing first with a time of 1:48.11.

In the sprint medley relay, the group of Lindsay Noskin, Johnson, Cate Wright and Elizabeth Markowitz crossed the finish line with a top time of 4:24.39.

The Cards added to its total when the foursome of Elizabeth Markowitz, Wright, Leeds and Michaud competed in the 4x400-meter relay event and finished on top with a time of 4:06.22. Their time was over five seconds faster than second place Staples.

The GHS girls team also had other athletes that fared well.

In the 300-meter run, Leeds took home the bronze with a time of 43.04, while Elizabeth Markowitz took the silver in the 600-meter run with a time of 1:38.50.

In addition to her performance in the 4x200-meter relay, D’Etiveaud was solid in two other events. Competing in the 55-meter dash, she finished sixth out of 37 athletes with a time of 7.61. D’Etiveaud fared one better in the high jump. Her height of 4-10 was good enough for fifth place overall and was only two inches away from the top spot.

“This is amazing and I don’t think this team’s ever been this successful,” D’Etiveaud said. “We have a great team. We have great leaders and great freshmen that are making an impact. I think with this win, we could do well at the next level. I thought we did great in the 4x200 relays and I got a personal record there. I came in sixth for the 55 and I didn’t think I would be able to do that because it’s my second time running that event. In the high jump I got fifth, but I thought I could have done better.”

Big Red’s Jennifer Goggin competed in two events for the Cardinals. In the 1,000-meter run, her time of 3:05.47 was good enough for fourth and was less than six second away from Abby Markowitz’s top time. In the 1,600-meter run, Goggin placed seventh overall with a time of 5:37.04.

Joining Goggin in the 1,000-meter run was Kathryn Bernstein, who finished cracked the top 10 with a time of 3:21.01.

Greenwich also had two other competitors in the 300-meter dash. Joining Michaud and Leeds in scoring points was Carolyn Paletta, who finished sixth overall with a time of 43.72. Fellow teammate Noskin was also in the race and finished 12th with a time of 44.59.

Rounding out the day for Greenwich was the duo of Vitoria Galbrier and Mia Bonanno, as both competed in the 600-meter run and finished 12th and 13th respectively with times of 1:49.26 and 1:49.78.

The Greenwich High boys team also was able to take command.

“The track trophy case has about an inch layer of dust on it, so now we could finally open it, add to it and clean out the dust,” Ryan Kelly said. “We all did great and everybody pulled through.”

Leading the way was the duo of Marcus Motill and Ryan Kelly. In the 600-meter run, Motill finished tops overall with a time of 1:23.28, while Kelly was close behind in second with a time of 1:23.35.

The duo battled again in the 300-meter run and Kelly took second overall with a time of 35.99. Motill placed fourth with a time of 36.26.

“Today was a great day for the boys and girls teams,” Motill said. “It’s shocking that the boys did so well. We had a few strong boys today but we were able to get a lot of other people placing really high. It felt great to win and to get two gold medals. It was a great experience.”

The duo, along with Elijah Dume and Nick Pulitano, started the competition in the 4x200-meter relay and finished golden, netting a time of 1:48.11.

“We all had tough workouts during the week and complained about them, but it showed that it all pays off in the end,” Kelly said. “The coaches know what they are talking about. You hate them during those tough practices, but love them at the end when you’re finishing like we are.”

A handful of GHS boys athletes helped contribute to the team’s point total.

In the shot put, Robert Gelicius helped Big Red grab the bronze with a distance of 43-09 1/2. In the 1,000-meter run, Daniel Wilbanks finished fifth overall with a time of 2:40.28, while Dume also grabbed fifth place overall in the 55-meter dash with a time of 6.85.

Dume continued his strong performance on the day by finishing sixth in the 300-meter dash with a time of 37.12. Wilbanks added to his total when he finished the 1,600-meter run sixth overall with a time of 4:40.17. Pulitano also fared well for the Cardinals. Competing in the 300-meter dash, he finished ninth overall with a time of 37.50. He also competed in the 55-meter dash and was seventh out of 35 competitors, netting a time of 6.89.

In the field events, Greenwich had two athletes join Gelicius in the shot put that finished in the top 15. Peter Kelly took 13th overall with a throw of 39-03 1/2, while teammate Alex McGee grabbed 14th with a distance of 39-01 1/2.

“Tonight there wasn’t one event where you could look back on and say that I wish a Greenwich kid did better,” Dubin said. “There were times were we didn’t get the place that we wanted, but when you look at the times, it’s impossible to be mad when everybody had personal bests and set a school record. I am proud of them all tonight.”

The Greenwich High School boys and girls indoor track team will return to the New Haven Athletic Center tonight when they compete in the CIAC class LL finals. The meet will get underway at 4.

“The tough training is over for both teams, but we still have to keep our minds in the winning mindset and get better all week,” Ryan Kelly said. “If we could do that, good things will happen.”

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