Platte County finishes impressive 3rd in Class 5 District 8 standings

LIBERTY, Mo. — Rylee Carr needed to recover after a school-record effort in the 4×100-meter relay in Saturday’s Class 5 District 8 meet at Liberty North High School.

Despite an objection from the coaches running the long jump, the Platte County senior took the allotted and allowed time before taking an attempt. She might have even taken a little motivation from the questions asked about her perceived lack of urgency in the event and ended up with the best individual performance of her career.

Carr went a career-best 5.35 meters and placed second, advancing out of districts for the first time in her career. Outside of special qualifying circumstances, teams have a maximum of two entrants per event, and the top four in each extended the season to this weekend’s Class 5 Sectional 4 meet scheduled for Saturday at Lee’s Summit North.

That also includes relays, and Platte County’s 4×100 team of Carr, fellow senior Adi Benninghoff and juniors Maggie Wagner and Vanessa Sarpong not only improved their school record but came in fourth by the closest of margins. Sarpong ran the anchor leg and won a lean at the line in a photo finish to beat out Staley.

Both teams ran 49.87, meaning the margin of victory came down to thousandths of a second.

Carr, Benninghoff, Wagner and Sarpong previously ran 49.98 at the Platte County Invitational in their first time running the event as a unit this season. Platte County junior Adi Kern, Wagner and Sarpong were on last year’s sixth-place Class 5 District 8 team that set a school record at 50.28 but finished sixth, meaning the season ended at that point.

Due to a nagging quad injury, Kern only competed in pole vault and won a district title, advancing to sectionals in the event for the second time in her career.

Due to the meet schedule, Carr and Wagner were due for the long jump competition, which allows for jumps to be completed by competitors in any order within a certain time frame. Carr’s 5.35-meter jump ranked behind only Lily O’Brien’s winning mark of 5.50.

Carr’s previous career-best 5.33 jump came at the Suburban Conference White Division Championships just 11 days earlier. She nows holds the No. 3 and 4 distances in the event in school history, trailing only Reese Pickett (5.43, 2023) and Tori Farr (5.52, 2017).

Wagner finished 10th in the long jump but came back later in the day to advance out of districts in two more events, giving her a team-high this weekend at sectionals. She cut over a second off of her prior PR in the 300 hurdles at 47.02 and finished a distant third to the top two.

Previously, Wagner ran 48.17 on the same track during April’s Ken Peek Invitational at Liberty North, but her new career-best now ranks 18th in Platte County history’s modern records with Isabelle Geddes owning 15 of the top 17 and Hilary Mathurin the other two.

Platte County’s lone individual district titles came from Kern and Benninghoff (100 hurdles).

Kern dominated the morning pole vault competition, again tying a career-best at 3.05 meters and going back to sectionals for the first time since her freshman season. She didn’t clear her initial height at districts as a sophomore in uncharacteristic off showing on a cold, windy day.

Benninghoff blazed to first in her lone individual race, posting a season-best 15.10 but still not under 15. She went 14.97 and 14.95 in back-to-back weekends as a junior at sectionals and state and still wants to erase one of the oldest track school records still on the book.

Jan Herndon still officially holds the mark at 14.93, which she set in 1983. Benninghoff holds an argument to the record because in the era of fully automated timing (FAT), handheld marks generally require an adjustment of rounding to the nearest tenth of a second and adding 0.24. Still, Benninghoff can take at least one more shot — and up to three — at going faster regardless of calculations.

Platte County’s 4×800 team of seniors Emily Huehl, Madelyn Stewart and Addie Ayers and freshman Mary Dellinger also took advantage of circumstances to take a district title. Only four teams entered the event, meaning all four advanced regardless of time just by finishing the race.

None of the teams ran for competitive times, but Dellinger took the baton and went to the front. Platte County finished in 10:18.37 — fourth-best time this season — but needs to try and better the season-best of 9:50.23 this weekend to have a shot at advancing to state. The Pirates bowed at sectionals last year with Ayers and Huehl the returners from that unit.

The top four in each event at Saturday’s sectional meet qualify for the Class 5 MSHSAA Track and Field Championships.

Impressively, Dellinger ran her anchor leg, left the meet and went to Kearney to play in the Platte County soccer team’s Class 3 District 8 first round game and returned later for the 4×400. The Pirates finished third with a lineup of Wagner, Huehl, Stewart and Dellinger again as the anchor.

Platte County’s 4:09.77 ended up a distant third behind Liberty (3:54.36) and Liberty North (3:59.79), but the same group ran a season-best 4:03.95 at the Platte County Invitational.

The placement did move Platte County to an impressive third-place finish in the 10-team standings with 83 points. Park Hill South dropped back to fourth with 82 after placing fifth out of five teams in the 4×400.

Platte County’s sectional contingent includes only three previous Class 5 MSHSAA Track and Field Championships qualifiers. Huehl medaled sixth at state in Kansas’ Class 1A as a sophomore at Wakefield before transferring ahead of her junior year. She posted a career-best 2:24.94 in the 800 but ended up fifth in a difficult field, meaning her and Stewart will both have just two races and Ayers one at this week’s sectional meet.

A two-time qualifier, Ayers medaled at state in the 4×800 as a sophomore as part of Platte County’s school-record relay. Benninghoff seeks a third straight trip. She did placed eighth in Class 5 as a junior after not advancing out of the state preliminaries as a breakout sophomore.

Platte County junior Kelly Bullano placed third in the javelin on Saturday at 36.72 meters, an encouraging season-best mark. She has not approached her top effort as a sophomore of 39.17, nor the school record of 41.55 she set while finishing fifth at state as a freshman.

Bullano advanced to sectionals for the third time, but she finished fifth and just out of the qualifying spots last season.