Adams sees his hard work pay off
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By Michael Boytim
mboytim@altoonamirror.com
SHIPPENSBURG -- Jake Adams missed out on a lot of moments during his senior year due to injuries.
He was determined not to let any of that get in the way of his most important.
The Altoona senior earned a silver medal Saturday in the long jump at the PIAA Class 3A track and field championships at Seth Grove Stadium at Shippensburg University and had it draped around his neck by his father and coach, Mike Adams.
"I'm definitely happy for him," Mike Adams said. "He's worked so hard to get here through two hamstring tears that caused him to miss football, miss indoor, and we weren't even sure if he was going to jump or not this year. He came out and had a great outdoor season. It didn't end exactly how we wanted, but I think we'll take it all things considering."
Adams was hoping for gold after earning a bronze medal as a junior with a jump of 22 feet, 2 inches, and he came as close as you can to earning it.
His jump of 22 feet, 2.75 inches was the best of the day until Saint Joseph Prep's Brendan Leneghan topped it with a leap of 22-8.75 on the final jump in the entire event.
"It was nice to get the silver medal, but I wanted the gold really bad," Jake Adams said. "Everyone has off days, but I'm still happy I came in and I'm happy with what I got. I was hoping, but it's whatever it is. I'm just happy to get what I did with my dad here. I'm glad I could get a medal for him."
Neither Adams or Leneghan approached their seed jumps.
"I just didn't have the pop today," Jake Adams said. "I thought I felt good warming up, but I didn't have that extra pop, which happens sometimes. The Saint Joes Prep kid and I are one-two in the state, and we were both a foot and a half behind our PRs today, so it was just one of those days."
Adams will continue his career at Penn State, and the Nittany Lions may benefit from Saturday's result.
"I'm even hungrier to do well at Penn State now since I didn't get the gold medal," Jake Adams said.
Two local teams made a splash in the final event of the day in 2A, the 1600 relay. Penn Cambria (Carter McDermott, Cole Eberhart, Brandt Patterson, Josh Stolarski) passed Central Cambria (Aiden Lechleitner, Cody Roberts, Jameson O'Brien, Josh Contorchick) on the final lap to place fourth in 3:27.46 ahead of the fifth-place Red Devils, who finished in 3:28.31.
"Up to this point in the season, we were 4-0 in this event against Central Cambria," said Stolarski, who ran the final lap and made up the deficit against the Red Devils. "I wanted to make it 5-0."
Both teams improved on their seeding time to earn medals.
"It made us so much better running against a local school like them all year," Lechleitner said. "You can't even measure it. It made us so much better."
Hunter Shawley of Bellwood-Antis medaled in the 2A 300 hurdles for the second-straight year after only picking up hurdling as a junior. He took home a seventh-place medal with a time of 40.32 on Saturday. Shawley was originally presented an eighth-place medal before a mistake was acknowledged and he was correctly placed seventh.
"It's unbelievable," Shawley said. "To be on this stand back-to-back years after just starting two years ago, that's something people dream about. There were a lot of mistakes I made that could have gotten me higher, but overall, it was OK."
Southern Columbia's Jake Rose won the state title in 38.91.
"Freshman year, coach asked me if I wanted to hurdle, and the first thing that came to mind was 'no,'" Shawley said. "Junior year, I picked up on it, and I'm really glad I did. It was worth it in the end."
SUBHED: Notable finishers
N Ethan Black of Conemaugh Township won the gold in the 2A 100 dash with a time of 10.78. Huntingdon's James Buonaccorsi won a bronze in 11.19. He also won gold with a comeback victory in the 200 dash in 21.45 over West Catholic's Marcel Jackson's 21.48. Buonaccorsi won a seventh-place medal in 22.49.
N Richland's Logan Gossard won the gold medal in the 2A pole vault by clearing 14-6. Dylan Andrews of Bellwood-Antis tied for 13th by clearing 12 feet.
N State College won the 3A 3200 relay state championship with a time of 7:45.36, just ahead of Haverford Township. Mathew Staniar, Trent Dinant, Nick Sloff and Sean Adams made up the championship team.
N Altoona's Ethan Stroup threw 167-7 and finished 14th in the 3A javelin. He finished 18th in the discus with a throw of 135-6 in the afternoon session.
N Penn Cambria's Trenten Murphy finished 21st in the 2A shot put with a throw of 42-11.75.
N The Central Cambria boys 3200 relay team (Roberts, Dom Kuntz, Devon Morgan, Lechleitner) just missed a medal in the 2A event with a time of 8:18.17, less than a second behind eighth-place finisher Greenville. Penn Cambria (Mason Hogue, Eberhart, Stolarski, Patterson) finished 11th in 8:25.95.
N Northern Bedford's Mason Detterline finished 14th in the 2A triple jump with a distance of 42-4.25. Penn Cambria's Carter McDermott was 21st with a 39-7.
N Central Cambria teammates Roberts (11th, 2:01.27) and Lechleitner (18th, 2:06.14) competed in the 2A 800 run. Lechleitner had earned a porterhouse steak from his older brother, Adam, by finishing the 800 in less than two minutes at the District 6 meet and finally got to cash in the bet before states.
"It was huge," Lechleitner said. "It weighed almost three pounds, and it was phenomenal."