Metamora sprints to top of 2A podium, BCC’s Whitaker and Morton set records
- Jonathan Michel
- 54 minutes ago
- 8 min read
CHARLESTON — There are several sounds like no other in track and field.
The firing of the starter’s gun. The roar of a crowd while coming down the home stretch. The stampede of cleats at the finish line.
But for Metamora on Saturday, there was no sound sweeter than the ‘clink, clink clink’ of their medals brushing against each other while walking off the track at O’Brien Stadium with its first team state title in program history.
The Redbirds fought through the ups and downs of a long track and field season, and again at the IHSA State Finals, going into the famed blue oval at Eastern Illinois University and painting it red.
“It feels amazing, I'll just say that, just going out here and competing with the best,” senior Jaiduan Cranford said. “Just us having a big year and track and pushing ourselves all through practices and seeing other teams, we just wanted to be better than them, always.”
“I talked with a bunch of coaches throughout the season who had been in some of these situations, I had never been in one of these situations,” Metamora head coach Sheridan Ray said. “Brett Charlton from Eureka and Chuck Danner, one of my coaches from Metamora said ‘Meet by meet, event by event.’”
“Looking to the end is fun, but you got to get to the end before you start thinking about that stuff.”
The Redbirds realized that a state title was a possibility early in the season. Ray preached to a team of over 100 athletes that each of them had a purpose: to push the guy in front of you.
That push reached Metamora’s top athletes, including its Cranford-anchored 4x200 relay and 800-meter runner Zach Born who led the Redbirds with state championships of their own on Saturday.
“All the way back to the indoor track meet at [University of Illinois], coach talked to us on the bus before we left and told us that we have a special team this year and if we do our thing, we have a chance to really impact the state of Illinois and just impact our high school as a whole and bring home a trophy,” Born said.
The Redbirds entered the day as the projected favorites, but endured a few early obstacles. Then, the middle of the afternoon hit and the floodgates opened for six Central Illinois athletes winning state titles within the span of roughly an hour.
And Metamora was right in the middle of it.
Born struck gold first, going stride for stride with IVC’s Aiden Duhs down the home stretch to win the 800 in 1:51.18, beating out Duhs by 0.27 seconds and setting the second-best time in Illinois this season.
“I didn't want to go out too hot, because I learned my lesson from sectionals,” Born said. “So I let Aiden [Duhs] and the other guy take the lead in the first part of the race, and I think what really helped me win that race was making the last move.”
Born perfectly executed his goal of staying in the chase pack and being the last runner on the track to begin his final move.
“I let Aiden go and then I slowly just reeled him in, reeled him in, reeled him in and then broke him at the last probably 25 meters and was able to get the job done,” Born said.
Born was one of three Central Illinois runners to win a title in the 800 meters as Illini Central/Delvan’s Coriell Green won in Class 1A and Born’s friend, Washington’s Ben Gorsage, won the Class 3A crown.
“Me and Ben are just 10 minutes away from each other, and it's just really crazy how I can lose confidence in the Mid-Illini and win state somehow, and I think that's just really special,” Born said. “That level of competition prepares you for days like this.”
The Jaiduan Cranford show followed shortly after.
The senior and star running back for the Redbirds grabbed the final baton and ran with fire in his eyes down the home stretch to capture a state title in his final high school race.
“We had a little difficulty in the 4x100 but we just knew we had to go out with a bang in our relays,” Cranford said.
Cranford was the straw that stirred the drink all season for the Redbirds. He finished fourth in the 100 meters, anchored the 4x100 relay that took fourth and also qualified for state in the 200.
Despite his future of playing football at Northern Illinois already set in stone — and tweaking his hamstring at the end of the 100 — Cranford decided he had no other choice but to go out strong.
“I had second guesses about it, I wanted to enroll early, but after a talk with my track coach and my dad, who’s coach for another team, he just said, ‘Finish it out, go out with a bang and why not?’ so that stuck with me a lot,” Cranford said. “You see the position I'm in right now, so I'm glad I made that choice and decided to come out.”
“I just told my coach, I can't leave without a state championship.”
“This year was like full Jaiduan,” Ray said. “Everything we did with him was pretty awesome to see. He could handle some things he wasn’t able to handle in the past and we saw the fruits of that labor.”
Metamora also picked up points with its 4x400 running in sixth, Paul Reason taking seventh in the 110-meter hurdles, McMillen finishing eighth in the 200 and AJ Ioerger placing sixth in the discus and ninth in the shot put.
McMillen, who transferred from Macomb before the school year and played wide receiver on the football team, couldn’t have pictured a better way to cap off his prep career.
“I couldn't forget these fellas, like, these are just my best friends,” McMillen said. “I can't imagine having a better season, football into track, they brought me in, welcomed me so well, and I just can't imagine being in any other spot.”
Whitaker leaves undeniable legacy with fourth pole vault title
Saturday at the state finals is always full of surprises, but Bloomington Central Catholic’s Isaiah Whitaker winning a pole vault state title felt like the closest thing to a guarantee.
The Saints’ high flyer already owned three Class 1A state titles on his mantle and added a fourth with a Class 2A championship to cap off a legendary high school career.
It was hardly a matter of if he would win, but just a matter of how high he would go. The answer was a Class 2A state meet record of 17 feet, 8.5 inches. He nearly cleared 18 feet, 2.5 inches, which would have set a new personal best, as well.
“I mean, having 1A and 2A state records and winning four years in a row. I'm stoked,” Whitaker said. “I just really wanted that last bar, but it was a great competition. I had a lot of pressure on me from the other kid.”
Whitaker admits his warmups weren’t as strong as he had hoped and had a miss on two separate heights, but the 17’8.5 clearance on his first attempt secured the title over Rochelle's Andrew Nuyen after passing on the previous height.
“Once competition started, everything kicked in and went back to natural,” Whitaker said. “But he started giving me a good run, and he started making first attempts… I start passing, that gets a little scary, because you have to make the next bar or you lose. It was a little nervous, but I knew I had it in me, and I was really proud.”
Whitaker’s next vaults in school uniform will come in blue and white as he’s headed to the University of Kentucky to continue his career. A future Olympic bid wouldn’t be out of the question either.
“I would probably just say great,” Whitaker said on how he wants to be remembered. “Like I want to see my name in the record boards, and just think, ‘Wow, that kid really made a legacy on Illinois pole vault.”
“Stunned”: Morton sets 2A record to win 4x400
Morton may have been the last Central Illinois team to pick up a state title on Saturday, but it’s performance in the 4x400 was one of the most impressive.
Entering with the second-best time in prelims, the Potters senior-less relay of freshman Thomas Seneca and juniors Jude Rogers, Keyston Beyer and Abe Martin singed the track with a new Class 2A state meet record time of 3:15.94.
That finish helped Morton finish fifth as a team
“I was stunned,” Martin said. “I knew we had a fast time in this but I did not know we’d run that fast but I knew we had it in us.
“It’s a journey and we had some ups and downs, but we ended the season on a really high note and I’m just so thankful for the team I have,” he added. “There’s no other three guys I’d rather do this with.”
Seneca used a late kick to come back from fifth to second by the time he passed the baton to Rogers, who then passed off to Beyer in third. A clean handoff to Martin allowed the Potters to take control of a three-team pack that was chasing Sterling.
Martin’s long strides down the back stretch allowed him to catch up and overtake for first heading into the final curve and he flew down the home stretch in front of a roaring crowd to complete the comeback.
“That’s how I run my races, I come from behind, I have that hunger in me to go find someone and I like to have my team cheering me on and getting me the stick where I need to get it,” Martin said.
The title marked Morton’s second in a relay in three years after its 4x200 won gold in 2024. The Potters’ latest state champions were just budding stars at that point, but the impact of the program’s alumni was still felt this year as its winning tradition continued
“We had some really, really good seniors and some alumni coming back to our meets, cheering us on,” Martin said. “We had some really successful runners like Christian Harris and Josh Weeks, seeing them back and cheering us on is just huge.”
Several runner-ups nearly taste top of podium
Outside of the 4x400, Morton had Crew Martin take second in the 110-meter hurdles (14.95) and fifth in the 300-meter hurdles (38.85), Maxwell Carter place ninth in the 1600 (4:20.85) and 10th in the 3200 (9:27.27) and its 4x800 place fourth in 7:49.78.
Normal U-High’s Xander Scray, IVC’s Aiden Duhs and Limestone’s Logan Smallwood all came away with silvers in their events. Scray cleared 6’8.25 in the high jump, Duhs ran a 1:51.45 in his battle with Born and Smallwood finished the 400 in 48.50. U-High also had Andrew Aldeman take 10th in the 1600 (4:24.39) and its 4x800 take 12th in 8:00.33
Manual’s Makai Hill finished fifth in the triple jump (44’11.5), Bloomington Central Catholic’s Ben Meyer took seventh in the 400 (49.49), Eureka’s 4x800 placed fifth (7:51.63), Owen Stoller took eighth in the pole vault (14’5.25) and Brock Monk finished 14th in the high jump (6’1.5). Peoria Notre Dame was led by Maxwell Kirby’s 12th-place finish in the 3200 of 9:33.14.