This article was written by Michael Newman and submitted by Sammy Biggs.
Bloomington, Ill – The Morrison High School Boys Track does not have an indoor season. They had jumped into a couple of meets before the Illinois Top Times Championships on Friday. None of the athletes on the team ran in individual events in the two meets that they competed in. They just competed in relays. We were just having fun was their common reply.
Morrison had fun on Friday evening sweeping all three relay events contested in this meet. Juniors Nick Allen, Nathan Mickley, Keegan Anderson, and Koby Brackemeyer ran on the winning 3200 Meter Relay and 800 Meter Relay. Freshman Hunter Newman replaced Allen in their winning 1600 Meter Relay.
Five athletes. Three wins. It is an incredible accomplishment. No team has won all three relays in the history of this meet let alone with only five athletes.
“We really did not back off for this meet. We trained right through it,” Brackemeyer said. “Yesterday we did stadiums (steps) and then 200’s on the track.
Morrison was seeded 10th in this 12-team field in the 3200 Meter Relay. It did not look for them early on as Nick Allen handed off the baton in eighth-place. Nathan Mickley moved the team up to fifth-place on the second leg. The third leg was the momentum changer as Keegan Anderson ran a 2:00 split for his 800 to move Morrison to the lead. Koby Brackemeyer ran his anchor split in 2:01.5 to give his team the win (8;16.57). Tremont (8:21.76) and Pleasant Plains (8:24.97), who traded off the lead early in the race, finished second and third.
It was the same quartet in the 800 Meter Relay with a different order. The name of the game in this indoor relay is getting the lead and holding it Morrison used Anderson as their leadoff man. He was all-state last spring in the 400 Meter Dash. He got Morrison the lead with a 22.9 opening split. Brackemeyer followed with 23.7, Mickley with 23.6, and Allen brought home the win (24.2). Morrison won (1:34.43) by more than a second ahead of St. Joseph-Ogden (1:35.86) while DuQuoin from Section 3 finished third (1:36.08).
By the time that the 1600 Meter Relay was ready to be raced, there was an aura surrounding the Morrison team. Other teams were looking, wondering, thinking if they could beat the red clad team.
Brackmeyer led off with a 53.1 to give his team the lead. The freshman Newman followed keeping the lead for Morrison with a 53.3 split. The third leg was the key as Harvest Christian and Tremont tried to make the pass on Mickley. That did not happen as the junior ran a 53.6 leg handing off to Anderson. Two strides into the final 400 and it was assumed that Anderson had it. They competed the sweep on Anderson’s 51.9 anchor leg. Morrison, the top seed in this event, held that running 3:32.17 for the win. Tremont (3:36.53) and Harvest Christian (3:36.71) followed.
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