Story below reprinted courtesy of:
Frankfort Times



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Clinton Central’s Britney Loveless (176) leads the pack around the turn during the 1,600-meter race at the Hoosier Heartland Conference Meet Tuesday. Loveless won the race and the Bulldogs won the title for the eighth straight year.

‘Clerical error’ originally gave conference title to Clinton Prairie

By Phil Friend
Published: Thursday, May 14, 2009 6:02 AM EDT
FLORA — When Clinton Prairie left Carroll High School Tuesday night, the Gophers thought they had ended the seven-year stranglehold Clinton Central had on the Hoosier Heartland Conference crown.

However, on Wednesday afternoon the title had been taken away from them.

Due to a clerical error, it turns out that Central had in fact won the title, giving the Bulldogs 134.5 points to Prairie’s 133.5. The error came in the long jump, where the points for Kaylea Eli’s second-place finish were incorrectly given to Prairie, not Central. The 16-point swing was enough to give Central the one-point victory. Before the fix, Prairie had out-pointed Central, 141.5 to 126.5.

“Our girls were just ecstatic, I can tell you that much,” Central girls coach Aaron Charles said when he informed them Wednesday afternoon. “They were pretty down in the dumps (Tuesday) night because we had some really good performances. We were pretty disappointed going home last night.”

Carroll track coach Mike Miller, who was the meet coordinator, apologized about the incident.

“That came from the inside and it was our fault,” Miller said. “We apologize profusely to the conference. That’s tough on everybody, especially when it has that much significance. It’s bad enough to make a clerical error but when we have one that switches conference champions, that’s bad.

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“In 30 years of doing this, this has never happened before. I feel terrible for the Clinton Prairie girls because they were so excited. As high as they were last night, I’m sure this is going to be a kick in the teeth to them.”

According to IHSAA rules, there is a 48-hour window after a meet is completed to fix any clerical errors in scoring.

Both Charles and Prairie coach Heath Johnson said errors in their own scorebook prevented them from taking a second look at the scores to make sure they lined up with the official score on Tuesday.

It was a bittersweet, but correct fix for Johnson. The Gophers were very emotional Tuesday night after it appeared they had bested the Bulldogs.

“They’re the rightful winners. I told the girlss to look at it from their perspective; if they won and they don’t correct it, imagine what it’d be like for them,” Johnson said. “What we can take away from that is every position counts. We gave Central everything they could handle last night. We can hang our hat on that. They’re the rightful winners and got the outcome they deserved.”

Once again, a lack of depth hurt the Gophers as they won eight events to CC’s five. Central received its wins from Amy Walker in the 400-meter dash (1:03.02), Kelsey Neal in the 800 (2:31.12), Britney Loveless in the 1,600 (6:00.75), Hadley Orr in the 100 hurdles (16.90) and the 1,600 relay team.

It was Central’s eighth-straight HHC title and fourth in a row for the team’s seniors. Walker, Neal and Loveless are all seniors.

“It was really exciting because our whole team tried to pull together, even the underclassmen,” Walker said. “We had won seven times in a row and wanted eight. That’s what we were looking for and Coach Charles has put a lot of work into it and we were really trying. It was disappointing to not get the victory lap and not celebrate there but knowing we got the win is good news.”

Carroll was third with 117 points while Tri-Central was fourth (64), Lafayette Central Catholic fifth (26) and Rossville sixth (19).

“They were a little motivated,” Charles said. “They didn’t want to be dethroned because they felt like Prairie thought this was the year to get them and our girls were determined and wanted to go out on a positive note.”

Courtney Hodgen carried the Gophers once again, winning her three individual events — the 100 (13.70), 200 (27.98) and long jump (14-10 1/2). The Gophers also got an unexpected lift from Raelyn Rawlings. The senior was favored to win the discus, which she did with a throw of 94-7 but she also upset Rossville’s Hilary Laughner in the shot put, winning with a throw of 32-1.

Prairie’s other winners were Alison Bailey in the 3,200 (13:03.01), Kaylen White in the 300 hurdles (49.10) and the 400 relay team (54.18 seconds).

There were many places one switch in the standings would’ve flipped it to Prairie. Charles pointed out the 3,200, where CC’s Nicole Cheek barely edged out CP’s Karla Ramos for sixth place. Central had to battle back after Central had fallen behind 32-2 after the shot put and discus events.

“We had some big performances in the 400, 800 and 1,600,” Charles said. “I was hoping we were going to counter that with our middle distance running and we did.”

This was the Bulldogs’ second-closest meet during their HHC run. In 2007, they won the 1,600 relay to edge Carroll by half-a-point.

“It took everyone last night,” Walker said. “That’s what we’ve been working on the past couple weeks. It was nice for it to pay off.”

RESULTS

100: 1. Hodgen (CP), 13.70. 2. Mathews (CP), 13.95. 3. Walker (CC), 13.97. 4. Humphries (TC), 14.20. 5. Neal (CC), 14.20. 6. Hughes (Car), 14.37.

200: 1. Hodgen (CP), 27.98. 2. Walker (CC), 28.44. 3. Mathews (CP), 28.59. 4. Hickner (Car), 28.88. 5. Zickmund (TC), 29.21. 6. Hughes (Car), 29.25.

400: 1. Walker (CC), 1:03.02. 2. Zickmund (TC), 1:03.50. 3. Hickner (Car), 1:05.10. 4. Hughes (Car), 1:06.02. 5. Eli (CC), 1:06.12. 6. Muhs (TC), 1:07.45.

800: 1. Neal (CC), 2:31.13. 2. Muhs (TC), 2:41.27. 3. Lewis (Car), 2:41.93. 4. Kennedy (Car), 2:42.56. 5. Cheek (CC), 2:51.85. 6. Pedigo (CP), 2:52.22.

1,600: 1. B. Loveless (CC), 6:00.75. 2. Bordner (Car), 6:04.03. 3. Cheek (CC), 6:04.83. 4. DeBoy (LCC), 6:05.59. 5. Ragan (Car), 6:13.33. 6. Bailey (CP), 6:22.45.

3,200: 1. Bailey (CP), 13:03.01. 2. Bordner (Car), 13:13.08. 3. Ragan (Car), 13:21.03. 4. B. Loveless (CC), 13:35.94. 5. Spencer (LCC), 14:01.40. 6. Cheek (CC), 14:44.75.

100 hurdles: 1. Orr (CC), 16.90. 2. Simmons (CC), 16.92. 3. Yoder (Car), 18.11. 4. White (CP), 18.12. 5. Reinke (Car), 19.36. 6. Clark (CP), 20.26.

300 hurdles: 1. White (CP), 49.10. 2. Reinke (Car), 50.08. 3. Yoder (Car), 50.91. 4. Simmons (CC), 52.33. 5. Wilson (CC), 53.83. 6. Smith (CP), 56.09.

Discus: 1. Rawlings (CP), 94-7. 2. Weber (CP), 84-7. 3. Ragan (TC), 84-0. 4. Laughner (RHS), 83-9. 5. Tussinger (Car), 80-2. 6. Ayers (Car), 68-0.

Shot put: 1. Rawlings (CP), 32-1. 2. Laughner (RHS), 31-8 1/2. 3. Tussinger (Car), 28-9. 4. Farley (CP), 28-3. 5. R. Loveless (CC), 25-9 1/2. 6. Ragan (TC), 25-5.

Pole vault: 1. Reinke (Car), 7-6. 2. Ellison (CP), 7-0. 3. Eli (CC), 6-6. 4. Schneckloth (Car), 6-0. 5. Loveless (CC), 6-0. 5. Silva (CP), 6-0.

High jump: 1. Walter (TC), 5-1. 2. Orr (CC), 5-0. 3. Heater (RHS), 4-8. 4. Farley (CP), 4-8. 5. Moore (CC), 4-8. 6. VanMilligan (LCC), 4-6.

Long jump: 1. Hodgen (CP), 14-10 1/2. 2. Eli (CC), 14-1 3/4. 3. Walter (TC), 14-1 1/2. 4. Yoder (Car), 14-0 3/4. 5. Orr (CC), 14-0 1/4. 6. McIntosh (LCC), 13-8 1/2.

400 relay: 1. CP, 54.18. 2. TC, 55.00. 3. TC, 55.65.

1,600 relay: 1. CC. 2. Car. 3. TC.

3,200 relay: 1. LCC, 10:44.04. 2. Car, 11:14.82. 3. CC, 11:45.94.