Rehoboth girls win first state title

ALBUQUERQUE

The Rehoboth girls track team did the unthinkable at the New Mexico Class 2A state track meet on Friday.

With very little depth, especially in the field events, the Lady Lynx won the state title.

The Lynx qualified only six athletes in the field events, but they made their presence known in the open sprints and relay races.

“As far as I know this is our first one,” Rehoboth coach Collier Kempton said. “I would have to fact check and go way back but I think is our first one.”

According to the New Mexico Activities Association’s archives, this is Rehoboth first state title.

Also on Friday, Navajo Pine freshman Ryan Kee won a state title in the 3200 meters with a winning time of 10:05.96 over Penasco’s Gilbert Valdez by nearly three seconds.

“I’m proud of myself that I won the two-mile,” said Kee, who led for most of the race.

In the final lap, Valdez briefly took the lead but in the last 300 meters Kee found another gear to outlast the Penasco runner.

“I kicked in and I was able to beat him,” he said.  “I felt like I could pass him and I just held on.”

In the girls’ team title, the Lynx tallied 91 points. The Academy for Technology and the Classics (ATC) took second with 82 points while Cloudcroft took third with 73.

The team race between Rehoboth and ATC was tight until the 200 meters as the Lynx had a 1-2-4 finish.

In that race, the Lynx earned 15 points headed by the first-place finish from junior Naomi Phillips, who clocked in at 27.17. Junior teammate Anna Huizinga (27.62) took second and Maddie Arsenault (27.75) placed fourth.

“I credit this mostly to coach and the team,” Phillips said of winning gold. “It’s a very tight community and everyone is so uplifting, and everyone is so supportive and it’s just a collective effort from everyone. We have an awesome team.”

In another point-scoring event, the Lynx collected 13 points in the 400 meters with eighth grader Audrey Huizinga winning gold, clocking in at 1:00.40. She edged her older sister, Anna, for the state title while sophomore Maggie Van Drunen took sixth.

With her first-place finish, Audrey reset the school record as Anna owned that record for eight days.

“It’s really fun racing against my sister,” Audrey said. “It was really fun to have that competition with her.”

The Lynx also dominated the relay races, winning the 4×100 (52.67), 4×200 (1:49.97) and 4×400 (4:18.85) while setting some new PRs.

“Some of the positivity is some of the PRs that we did see,” Collier said. “We had some multiple PRs, including kids that didn’t win their events.”

For a more in-depth story pick up next week’s Navajo Times.

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