The Rahway boys, riding an impressive distance triple from Micah Lawson, won its first title since 2018, and the Union Catholic girls, who burned up the track with an electrifying performance in the shuttle hurdles, captured its eighth straight championship at the Union County Relays on Wednesday at the Jersey City Armory.
The biggest highlight of the meet came in the girls shuttle hurdles when senior Ajanae Thompson, (7.3), sophomore Taylor Cox NJ (7.4), junior Leah Gould (7.9), and senior Alexandra Bonn (7.9) nearly took down the state record with a sizzling 30.87, a Union County record and the second fastest time in state history!! Winslow owns the state record of 30.74, which it set at the 2014 state Group 3 relays.
Union Catholic, which defeated runner-up Rahway, 56-30, will get one more shot at Winslow’s record at the State Non-Public Championships on Jan. 13 at the Bennett Center in Toms River. The shuttle hurdles event with four hurdles aren’t run very often. The New Balance Nationals Championship meet uses five hurdles.
In addition to the victory in the shuttles, the UC girls also won the 4×200 in 1:43.10, the 4×800 in 10:28.08, and the sprint medley in 4:16.41, and placed second in DMR , and second in the high jump. UC freshman Ebony Turner cleared a meet-best 5-0.
On the boys side, Rahway’s march to its first title in five years was sparked by the Rutgers-bound Lawson.
Lawson, who won the XC Meet of Champions title this past fall, split 4:25 on the runner-up DMR, 2:08 on the winning 4×800, and 1:59.6 on the runner-up sprint medley relay to lead the Indians to a 48-35 victory over runner-up Union.
Rahway, which scored in seven of the 8 events, also won the shuttle hurdles with a blistering NJ No. 1 time of 31.10, placed third in the 4×200, fifth in the high jump, and third in the shot put. In the shuttles, Tamar Wynn-Bouie (7.5), Cody Wilson (7.7), Jaydin Lopez (7.7), and Marquis Diggs (8.0) combined on the red hot-victory for Rahway.
“We know that in order to be a championship caliber team we have to be a complete team,” said Rahway coach Leon Bunion. “So the goal this year is to be competitive in all event areas, and the guys stepped up scoring in seven out of eight events (we ran alternates in the 4×400 because the title was already clinched). We came in simply looking for quality performances. It’s still very early in the season and this is our only our 3rd competition, so we were just excited to get out there and compete. The guys really stepped up and showed that we are headed in the right direction. There is still a lot of work to do, but the pieces are coming together.”
