Palmyra girls shine at state track meet after moving up in classification

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. — Palmyra’s first year in Class 3 almost resulted in a trophy for the girls track team on Saturday on the final day of the Missouri state track and field championships.

The Panthers tied for sixth with 29 points, four points out of a fourth-place trophy thanks to scoring points in four events during the two-day event at the Licklider Track Complex.

Sophomore Candra King was a runner-up in the discus, her second all-state medals in two days.

She was in third place following a throw by Bowling Green’s Andrea Korte, but King threw 37.16 meters in her final attempt and finished second with a final mark of 121 feet, 11 inches.

“I was hoping for first. I was just off,” King said. “I was second until Andrea threw and then I went in there focused and got it. I finished better than I did last year.”

King was 15th in Class 2 last year.

Lamar’s Phajja Gordon won the title by two inches and did so on her penultimate throw.

Palmyra received 14 points in the pole vault thanks to a 2-3 finish.

Abbey Redd cleared 3.25 meters and lost a tiebreaker for the championship to Montgomery County’s El Reagan. It came down to misses and Redd missed at 3.25, while Reagan cleared it in her only attempt.

Alaina Loman took third, clearing 3.18.

In the 100-meter hurdles, freshman Sydney Compton picked up her first all-state medal by taking fourth place in 15.69 seconds.

“I kind of came out of blocks a little bit stronger so I could have gotten stronger but overall I think I did pretty good,” Compton said. “It feels amazing, especially coming here as a freshman. It just makes me really excited to come back.”

Junior Hayes Miller medaled in three of the sprints to account for all six points for the Panthers’ boys.

He was sixth in the 400 (50.60), seventh in the 200 (22.40) and eighth in the 100 (11.27).

“It’s so fun to have such good competition because some of the meets where we go to, there’s no competition at all and that’s just not fun,” Miller said. “And just coming here, the intensity of the crowd and everything is just so surreal and it’s just amazing.”

When he was done, Miller even found himself being a fan of the meet — taking in the difference competing in the Class 1-2 meet compared to the Class 3-5 weekend.

“It is completely different and after my events, I watched Class 4 and Class 5 and it is crazy the times they put up,” he said.

Hannibal had a pair of all-state showings on Saturday to wrap up the weekend. The girls scored 11 points to place 21st, while the boys were 26th with eight points.

Junior Cameron Nichols ran the 400 dash in 50.84 to take sixth place.

The Pirates also got points in the 4×100-meter relay. Aneyas Williams, Markahl Humphrey, Haden Robertson and Sheldon Bergheger comprised that team that was seeded sixth heading into the race.