Girls track and field: Wheaton Academy's Best goes 3 for 3

That's Karyn Best - as in the best.

The senior sprinter for Wheaton Academy and Cal State-Fullerton commit won all three of her events at the IHSA Class 2A Lisle girls track and field sectional meet Thursday.

That included perhaps the marquee race of the entire evening, a showdown in the 200-meter dash with Sterling senior Erin Long, which Best won easily in 26.41 seconds.

"I know Erin Long pretty well, we trained together over the summer," Best said. "I expected her to win, to be honest. I kind of got in the blocks, and I'm like, I remember qualifying for the first time in this lane, right here, as a sophomore.

"It seemed at the time the greatest thing in my life, and I wanted to do that again. I needed to end my competing on this track with a win in the same way - same event, same lane, same track."

Earlier, she handily won the 110 hurdles in 14.75 seconds, just .06 ahead of runner-up Brooke Barkocy of Burlington Central, and the 300 hurdles.

Best wasn't the only one with a banner night. Consider Rosary, which won the team competition with 95.50 points behind nine state qualifiers, including four sectional champions.

Senior Brooke Delahanty won both the 400 dash and the 800 run, while freshman Lauren Roskuszka took first in the triple jump with a leap of 33 feet, 1.25 inches. The 1,600 relay team of junior Julie Bottarini, senior Julianne Hutchison, freshman Annie Molenhouse and Delahanty also won in 4:00.45.

Glenbard South walked away with three state qualifiers, though there were no sectional champions among that group. The most dramatic may have been the 3,200 relay team of junior Julia Clingen, junior Ania Gniatczyk, senior Cassidy Shirley and freshman Kelly Anderson, which just managed to slip into state with a fourth-place time of 9:55.03.

"Winning conference we were so happy about," Gniatczyk said. "We were like, we can really do this, if we push ourselves hard enough. I'm so proud of everyone on that relay. With all that training we were able to push ourselves to a way we never thought we could before."

Also qualifying for the Raiders were Maggie Bair, who took second in the shot put and senior Emma Taylor in the high jump with a top leap of 5 feet, 1 inch.

Speaking of the high jump, that was another finish stocked with drama, as there was a jump off for the sectional title between Aurora Central Catholic sophomore Ella Engelhardt and Montini senior Andrea Munoz. Both had top jumps of 5-1 heading into the jump off, but Engelhardt won the sectional title by hitting on 5-3.

"It's kind of intimidating," Engelhardt said of the jump off, "but you kind have to go for it. You have to want it."

Added Munoz: "You can't think too much about it, or you psyche yourself out, and that's not good. This time I heard my name and I went for it."

Aurora Central Catholic also got state qualifiers with runner-up finishes by sophomore Lesley Viveros in the 800 run and freshman Maggie Dervis in the 400 dash.

St. Viator freshman Katie Castelli made a name for herself in the 3,200 run by winning it in 11:23.30, more than three seconds ahead of Rochelle junior Katherine Bakken.

Burlington Central took third in the team competition with 58 points. The Rockets had no sectional champs, but did get a pair of second-place finishes by Barkocy in the 110 hurdles and 300 hurdles.