TACOMA — Pono Fuiava made her last chance count.
Central Kitsap’s sophomore discus thrower was down to her last opportunity and sitting in sixth place. Her best throw to that point was a little over 125 feet, and she had just watched Carissa Stovall of Yelm pull into the lead with a toss of 138.
But both Fuiava and her coach Bill Braun knew she had a throw of 140 feet in her. She stepped up on her final chance, whirled and launched the discus 146 feet, one inch. She broke the West Sound record for the discus and won herself a 3A state championship.
“I just didn’t give up,” Fuiava said.
Fuiava’s throw broke the record previously held by Angela Sampson of South Kitsap by nearly seven feet. It is currently the second best throw in all of Washington this season. The previous Central Kitsap school record had been set in 1975, which was the second-oldest track and field record on the books.
“I got chills,” Braun said. “It was there, I knew it was there. I’ve been seeing it for weeks in practice.”
A quick technical adjustment before her last throw helped, as her previous five throws had been between 102 and 125 feet. Braun told Fuiava she needed to drive better with her hip and leg and keep her arm up high.
“That’s all I wanted — to hit 140,” Fuiava said.
Kitsap hurdlers cruise through preliminaries
South Kitsap’s Deyondre Davis and Bremerton’s Lauryn Chandler are both contenders to win state championship in their respective 110- and 100-meter hurdles and events, and both bypassed the preliminary races with ease on Thursday.
Davis, also a contender in the 300-meter hurdles, had a little bit of trouble at the start, but recovered quickly and recorded the best preliminary time of the day, 14.37. He’ll have the top seed time heading into Friday’s finals.
“I hit two of them right at the start,” Davis said. “I thought it was going to mess me up, but I found my rhythm pretty quick after that.”
Chandler will go in as the No. 2 seed after running a 14.94 in the 100-meter hurdles. McCall DeChenne of Ephrata recorded the top time at 14.68.
North Kitsap 4×200 sets West Sound record in preliminary race
The Vikings foursome of Emerson Bollert, Raelee Moore, Madeline Pruden and Alyssa Cullen had the top time in 2A for the 4×200 for most of the year until they were eclipsed by Sammamish last week. But it didn’t play out that way in the prelims.
North Kitsap ran the top time of 1:43.75, beating both the West Sound record — previously held by Central Kitsap — and the school record in the event. Pruden and Cullen, the final two runners, did a tremendous job of closing an early gap.
Other results from Day One
The South Kitsap 4×400 relay team only had the seventh fastest seed time heading into the preliminary race, but the foursome of Savannah Kambich, Ella Hopper, Evelyn Collins-Winn and Paxton DePoe finished third with a 4:01.01 mark and qualified for the finals, as did the boys 4×400 team.
Central Kitsap junior Ezekiel Sousou medaled on Thursday, finishing third in the shot put with a throw of 53 feet, 11.5 inches.
In the 3A 1600-meter run, Central Kitsap sophomore finished 10th with a time of 5:09.61. In the 4A mile race, DePoe took ninth for South Kitsap with a 5:07.73 mile.
At the 1A state meet, Klahowya’s Dylan Jackson qualified for the finals in the 100-meter dash with a time of 11.18, giving him the sixth best time.
Alea Schultz took sixth in the 1A high jump with a leap of five feet and Alyssa Becker took 10th in the 1600-meter run with a time of 5:22.78.
— Mark Krulish is a reporter for Kitsap News Group. He can be reached at mkrulish@soundpublishing.com. Follow him on Twitter @MKrulishKDN.
South Kitsap’s Deyondre Davis had the top time in preliminary run of the 110-meter hurdles. (Mark Krulish/Kitsap News Group)
North Kitsap’s Alyssa Cullen anchored her team’s record-setting 4×200 relay performance. (Mark Krulish/Kitsap News Group)
