Published: May 10, 2008 12:10 am         

West Noble girls are track champions

Led by individual junior standout Chelsea Hite, the West Noble Chargers captured the team title in the Northeast Corner Conference girls track and field meet Friday night at Fairfield.

West Noble totaled 123 points, followed by Central Noble 87.5, Fairfield 87, Westview 85, Churubusco 58, Fremont 47, Eastside 37, Prairie Heights 36, Lakeland 32.5, Angola 18 and Hamilton 13.

The Chargers also won the regular-season title with an undefeated record.

“This feels great considering we lost our top three or four scorers from last year to graduation,” West Noble coach Nichole Emmert said.

“Going into the meet, I knew we could win, but I expected the scores to be closer. The girls performed better than expected.”

Hite was a triple winner, finishing first in the 100 (13.13), 200 (27.4) and 400 (1:02.07).

“She scored an incredible number of points for us,” Emmert said. “She is unusual in the fact that you don’t see many 6-4 sprinters. We have had to do some unorthodox things with her in the blocks, because her body doesn’t want to do the normal things.

“I knew she could run fast, but didn’t know if she could win all three events in one night.”

Hite said. “This is awesome. The 400 is probably my best event, but it is also my least favorite since it is the toughest one. I only ran the 200 twice this year before tonight. The coach put me in the 200 one night when we needed points.”

She has heard all the comments before about how she doesn’t look like a sprinter.

“I like proving people wrong by doing things they don’t think I can,” Hite said.

She used her long stride to her advantage by overcoming a deficit at the beginning of the 100.

“My height makes it hard for me to get out of the blocks,” Hite explained. “I use a different position in the blocks than most sprinters. Coach says whatever it takes as long as I keep winning.”

Hite was quick to recognize her teammates and their contributions to the team championship.

“It’s awesome to win the team title,” she said. “We have so many girls who have worked so hard to win. I play basketball in the winter, but a lot of the girls are out in the freezing cold running.”

Also winning for the Chargers was junior Candice Huntsman 100 hurdles (16.90).

One other Charger, Emmert highlighted was freshman Allissa Peterson in the 1,600 (third in 5:29.42).

“She was only a few seconds off the school record, which is held by Maria Harriman who was quite a runner,” the coach said.

“We have a good group of freshman in both the sprints and distance events. They all did well.”

Westview senior Tiffany Fisher won high jump (5-4) and long jump (16-0 1/4).

Fairfield senior Megan Miller placed second in the 100 hurdles (17.04) and sophomore Diamond Setterberg second in the 800 (2:30.37), second in the 1,600 (5:26.93) and third in the 3,200 (12:14.28).

“We did great. It was a great ending to a great season,” Fairfield coach Darin Holsopple said. “Last year we made a huge improvement and finished third in the meet. This year we got third and we just nosed out of second by our finish in the 4 x 400 relay.

“Setterberg had an outstanding night. This is the first meet this season she has run all three distance races and she had season-best times in each one.

“We had a bunch of girls step up for us. We scored points in just about every event.”