By Lev Rourke
Photos: Kim Spir
Full results
EUGENE – It was the dramatic conclusion of the Kellie Schueler era at Hayward Field last weekend in the state 4A-5A-6A state track championships, and the beginning of a new era. Whose stamp will be the brightest? Will it be sprinters Arthur Delaney and Thomas Tyner? Multitalented Haley Crouser, the latest of the amazing Crouser family? Seventeen-foot pole vaulter J.J. Juilfs? (Juilfs photo courtesy of Rick Russell.)
Any way you slice it, the new kids were rushing in the door just as young stars the likes of Schueler, Dakotah Keys and Sam Crouser – Haley’s older brother – were closing it.
The youthfulness of 
this year’s meets was striking. In the boys 6A 100 final, there was only one senior, the football star Keanon Lowe of Jesuit. He finished 3rd, in 10.78, a country mile behind Delaney, the junior from Barlow who repeated as champion, and Tyner, the remarkable ninth-grader out of Aloha. Lowe ran 10.42 with a 3.0 wind, the fastest 100 ever run by an Oregon prep, and the 15-year-old Tyner was close behind at 10.54, by far the fastest ever run by an Oregon freshman. “It was a great opportunity for me,” Tyner said, “especially as a freshman. He just had a better finish than me.”
this year’s meets was striking. In the boys 6A 100 final, there was only one senior, the football star Keanon Lowe of Jesuit. He finished 3rd, in 10.78, a country mile behind Delaney, the junior from Barlow who repeated as champion, and Tyner, the remarkable ninth-grader out of Aloha. Lowe ran 10.42 with a 3.0 wind, the fastest 100 ever run by an Oregon prep, and the 15-year-old Tyner was close behind at 10.54, by far the fastest ever run by an Oregon freshman. “It was a great opportunity for me,” Tyner said, “especially as a freshman. He just had a better finish than me.”For much of Saturday afternoon, it appeared that Delaney – who also won the 200 in 21.28, breaking Jordan Kent’s meet record by .01, and placed 3rd in the long jump – would propel the Gresham school to the team championship, despite the absence of their thrower, Ryan Crouser – Sam’s cousin – to surgery. But in the final race of the day, Tigard won the 4x4 to win the meet by 1 point.
The Crouser family was everywhere, figuratively and historically. Big Sam, the senior at Gresham High, swept the three throws – shot, disc, jav – becoming just the second Oregonian to win all three. The other person to do it? His Uncle Brian 30 years ago. Nevertheless, Sam clearly was disappointed. He didn’t PR, he didn’t get any 
meet records. The Crousers have become accustomed to the record books.
meet records. The Crousers have become accustomed to the record books.So his younger sister, Haley, has begun her record-book entry. She merely won the javelin in her first appearance at the state meet, threw a lifetime best (161-6), broke the state’s all-time freshman record. Later, she placed in the hurdles, and her father, Dean, said a heptathlon was in her plans soon.
There was also no getting away from the dominant presence of the seniors Keys and Schueler. Keys swapped the javelin – in which he placed 2nd a year ago – for the high jump in his attempt to win four individual events this year and lead his Sweet Home team to the 4A boys team title. It worked. He won the long jump, high hurdles, pole vault and the HJ, and Sweet Home won by a solid margin. Keys, whose personal saga by now is legend – moving from town to town, at times living in the family car – said he was happy, and also ready to move on. He is an unusual young man, the beginning of a beard perhaps evidence that he doesn’t seem like a teenager. He’s getting married in September to his high school sweetheart – a young woman who is already in college – and he is looking forward to joining the Oregon track team then as well, to become a decathlete. For Keys, it’s all about home, faith, stability, team, perseverance.
Schueler – outgoing where Keys is reserved, fiery where Keys is contemplative – could not have written her concluding script. A balky hamstring at the final meet of her long, distinguished high school career? A bad leg that will keep her from getting that perfect 16-for-16? No one had ever seen the young woman from Summit (Bend) lose. They were so accustomed to watching her win, there were gasps from the packed house of 10,000 on Saturday (there were another 9,300 on Friday) as Melissa Baller of Glencoe inched closer and closer to Schueler in the 5A 200. Kellie’s going to lose? No way! She won by a small margin, 24.86-24.96, and limped to the infield, grabbing her wrapped left leg. Would she have to skip the 4x4, and settle for 15? Would she run the relay, with the chance that her leg would give out, risking a blemish to that streak of perfection?“My hamstring was pulsating” during the 200, Schueler said. “I had to slow down or it was going to tear. The 4x4 means the world to me. It’s gonna hurt a lot. … My hamstring hasn’t felt good the whole week. I can’t believe I’ve held up…
“It hurt all day Friday, but it didn’t hurt this bad at all… I have to talk to my coaches about whether to run. But I have my health to look out for.”The time schedule is not kind to doublers, let alone quadruplers. Her schedule Saturday was 100 final at 2:35, 400 at 3:05, 200 at 4:35, 4x4 at 5:45. Four races in three hours. And after each race, 15 minutes of standing around while waiting to get on the podium to get another award, another round of snapshots. After each race on Saturday, her mother, Rochelle Schueler, rubbed her hamstring with her daughter stretched out flat on the ground on the infield.
Then word came. “She told me, ‘I’m gonna do it. I’m OK,’” Rochelle Schueler said. “For about five minutes, she said No. But then she was able to stride out, and she felt OK. But she told her teammates, ‘You’d better give me a lead.’”
They led for a while, but then Glencoe went to the front down the straightaway heading into the final exchange. Who anchors for Glencoe? None other than Baller, the young woman who was a close 2nd in the 200 and who had run 56-point in the 400 prelims the day before. And not far behind Summit was Hermiston, anchored by the talented Angelica Rodriguez. She had run 55.63 to get 2nd in the 400. With Schueler on a balky leg, there was in pressure in front, and to the rear, with a four-year quest for perfection on the line.
“I really wanted to lay it on the line for my team,” Schueler said. “I really need to do this. I think I can. My coach said to run 85%. I thought, ‘Well, I not might get it,’ but at 200 meters I thought, ‘I can beat this girl.’” Baller didn’t have a chance. Schueler powered past her on the final turn and never looked back.
“I felt so good down the straightaway. I kept waiting for my hamstring to pop. In the relay, you’re out there for your teammates. That makes it easier to run. I’ve always anchored the 4x4. They run their legs knowing I’m there (to anchor).
“Do you know what I was thinking down the straightaway?” Schueler said. “I was thinking to 
myself, ‘God, this is so dramatic. This is the most dramatic thing that has ever happened to me! It was like a TV miniseries.”
myself, ‘God, this is so dramatic. This is the most dramatic thing that has ever happened to me! It was like a TV miniseries.”The other senior stars, Keys and Crouser, were mostly in field events and didn’t get nearly as much attention, although the fans clapped in unison every time Crouser stepped into the ring for the shot or discus, or onto the javelin runway. He settled for winning marks of 60 feet in the shot, 193 in the disc and 224 in the javelin, all of those well below the high standard he had set during the regular season but also well beyond any challengers.
“I think I was sidearming the javelin a little,” he said. “I have a lot of stuff to work on. Three events, it’s hard to do. I’m happy. I was just hoping to do a little better. Hopefully this summer I can go to some big meets and throw farther.”
During the spring season Sam broke his cousin Ryan’s year-old all-time state best in the discus, throwing 205-10, the longest throw in the country this year, and he broke the national record in the javelin, throwing 244-2. He said he plans to compete in both events at the national Juniors meet later this month in Des Moines, Iowa, with the goal of trying to make the U.S. team for the World Junior championships, to be held this summer in Eastern Canada. 
“It’s all over,” Crouser said after his final javelin throw. “It’s a good way to go out. Three state titles, wow. It’s nice to have Ryan and all my family here. “
Keys, who won four events, reflected on the end of high school as well. “My team made it really fun,” he said. “The community, people from my church, my whole family, everyone is here. It’s been overwhelming. Now, it’s time to leave that behind and start something new. Some Oregon fans I’ve never seen before were cheering for me.”
Keys has signed with Oregon and plans to become a decathlete. He plans to marry his high school sweetheart in September. She is a nursing student, and plans to transfer to Oregon by then so that they can move in together by fall semester. Keys didn’t mind sharing such personal details openly, perhaps because his personal life story – living on the road, homeless at times – has been written. “I can’t really complain how my life has worked out,” he said. “This is my life. I haven’t ever wished for anything different.”
Other seniors were on their way to new lives as well:
· Nathanael Franks, the senior whose 4th-place finish in the 300 hurdles nearly won the meet for Barlow, was on his way to the University of Arkansas, where he is receiving an academic scholarship to study chemistry, and where he plans to walk on to the track team in the decathlon. He won the high jump with a lifetime-best 6-7 clearance. The 6-foot-3, 210-pound Franks has never done a decathlon but feels his varied background makes him a good prospect. “When I lived in Germany, I played team handball and tennis,” he said. Franks was an exchange student in Germany; he taught himself the language before going, then took Italian once he arrived. “I also ran half-marathon. At Barlow I did football – slotback on offense, linebacker on defense – and basketball, I played small forward, and soccer.” He visited three campuses before choosing Arkansas. “I enjoyed the Southern hospitality,” Franks said. “They’re outdoorsy people, that’s my style.” Franks
is valedictorian of his class and has a 4.0 GPA. · Howard Lao (Cleveland, Portland) was upset winner of the 5A high hurdles in a lifetime-best 14.32, breaking the meet record by two-tenths. He credited his private coach with his success. “I didn’t have a coach at Cleveland (in the hurdles),” Lao said, “so I had to go find one. I looked on Facebook, everywhere, and eventually I found Coach Fernando. Every Saturday, every Sunday, I would work with him. He told me, ‘You can go 14.3’ He called it.” Lao is headed to the University of Washington as a walk-on.
· Lauren Lloyd (Hood River Valley) won the 6A 800 in a PR, 2:10.95, overcoming two years of disappointment at the state meet. “The past 
two years I got 2nd by barely nothing,” she said. “It was so rough. I’ve worked so hard. I was really nervous before the race, but I was excited.” Lloyd is going to Cornell University in upstate New York in the fall. “It was between the University of Utah and Cornell,” she said.
two years I got 2nd by barely nothing,” she said. “It was so rough. I’ve worked so hard. I was really nervous before the race, but I was excited.” Lloyd is going to Cornell University in upstate New York in the fall. “It was between the University of Utah and Cornell,” she said. · Daniel Winn (Cleveland, Portland) was the surprise 5A winner of both the 1,500 and 3,000, defeating the Crater duo of Max Runia and Josh Elliott. Crater went on to the team title. “I felt someone coming up on me with 200 to go,” Winn said. “When I saw it was Josh, that scared me. I knew I would have to kick with everything I had, so with 
200 left I pushed hard, and he passed me anyway!” Elliott faded in the stretch however, and Winn took it, 4:01.35-4:01.67. Winn plans to attend Oregon in the fall, as a walk-on. “I’ve been talking to Coach Powell,” he said. “I decided I wanted to go where I could give myself a chance to be the best runner I can be. I wanted to go where I could improve.”
200 left I pushed hard, and he passed me anyway!” Elliott faded in the stretch however, and Winn took it, 4:01.35-4:01.67. Winn plans to attend Oregon in the fall, as a walk-on. “I’ve been talking to Coach Powell,” he said. “I decided I wanted to go where I could give myself a chance to be the best runner I can be. I wanted to go where I could improve.”· Julia Fonk (Franklin, Portland, pictured below) surprised Annamarie Maag (Jesuit, Portland pictured at top of article) in the 6A 1,500, pulling away on the final lap to win, 
4:36.54-4:38.34. Maag won the 3,000 the previous day and led Jesuit to the team title. “I’m going to the University of Portland,” Fonk said. “I considered some smaller D-3 schools as well but chose U of P.” Later in the day Fonk finished 3rd in the 800, behind Lloyd and South Eugene sophomore Paige Kouba, who ran 2:12.33. 
4:36.54-4:38.34. Maag won the 3,000 the previous day and led Jesuit to the team title. “I’m going to the University of Portland,” Fonk said. “I considered some smaller D-3 schools as well but chose U of P.” Later in the day Fonk finished 3rd in the 800, behind Lloyd and South Eugene sophomore Paige Kouba, who ran 2:12.33. And then there were the youngsters. Haley Crouser was not the only freshman to win a state title. The 4A 300-hurdle races were both won by ninth-graders, the girls’ race by Claire Thomas of Molalla, the boys’ by Joe Delgado of Ontario. An hour later, there was Thomas again, leading off her 4x4 team. Delgado was mobbed by his teammates, including the peroxided, UW-bound Matt Anthony who swept the 4A sprints (10.72w/21.90).
Photo of Trevor Barrett, who finished in 8th place in the boys' 5A javelin, is courtesy of Rick Russell.