By: Carolyn M. Hartko
It isn’t often that a coach will tell his athletes to do just enough to get by, but that was the strategy for the Monroe Township High School girls’ track team this past Monday. The less-than-all-out effort proved to be quite enough as the Lady Falcons flew past Perth Amboy 90-32, keeping their record perfect at 5-0.
"I kind of held the team back a little bit, because we had a big meet coming up on Wednesday, probably for the division title, between us and Bishop Ahr," girls’ head coach Lew Stonaker said. "I wanted them to save their legs for (Wednesday). So, I told them let’s just run well enough to win, and not get anybody hurt, and get through the day. And that’s pretty much how we worked it."
Even with that caveat, Monroe won all but three events: the high jump, discus and javelin. Senior Ashley Maguire tripled, winning the long jump, intermediate hurdles and the 400 meter race. Junior Ashley Theinert aced both sprints, clocking 13.2 seconds in the 100, and 28.2 in the 200. Other Falcon firsts went to Meghan Farrell (800), Liz Segarra (1600), Nova Roman (3200), Bernadette Moke (100 hurdles) and Asya Perry (shot put).
In boys’ action on Monday, Perth Amboy reversed the outcome, beating Monroe 98.5-32.5. The Panthers remained unbeaten at 6-0, and Monroe is now 5-1.The Falcon boys were looking forward to hosting Bishop Ahr on Wednesday for a meet that head coach Tom Tramaglini expected to be more competitive.
"Perth Amboy is a good team," Tramaglini said. "They’re very strong in the sprinting events. I don’t think they’re as good as South Plainfield, but they’re still loaded. They have some legitimate runners."
There were only three Falcon winners on Monday. Chris Sardone ran 2:08 in the 800, and Matt Horsch threw 138-4 in the javelin. Tim Payne took the discus with a toss of 111-6, than picked up third in the shot put with a personal best of 43 feet. Tom Kowaleski was second in the shot (43-11).
"I really wasn’t happy with the way we ran (at Perth Amboy) on the track," Tramaglini said. "I have very high expectations for a lot of the kids. And I think Monday was maybe not a setback but I don’t know if we were mentally prepared."
Part of that could simply be fatigue. A few of the top Falcons ran over the weekend in the Penn Relays, and the underclassmen from both squads competed in the Greater Middlesex Conference Freshman/Sophomore meet held at South Plainfield on Sunday.
This was the first year that boys and girls competed on the same day, and at the same venue.
In the boys’ flight of the Freshman/Sophomore meet, Scott Roman scored a top-five finish in the 3200 (11:02). On the girls’ side, the Lady Falcons brought home a total of 43 medals. Megan Boyce won the javelin, then went on to medal in the shot and discus as well. Sasha Potter placed second in the 200, and fifth in the 100. Segarra took first in the 3200, and Debbie Stelmaszczyk finished third in both the 200 and 400.
Neither squad medaled at the Penn Relays, but just being part of such a big track tradition was its own reward. On Friday, the boys’ 4×100 team ran a 48.81, just one second off the school record. The 4×400 squad clocked a 3:46.27 in Saturday’s competition.
"I thought we ran really well," Tramaglini said. "The weather was terrible on Saturday. Those kids were slipping all over the place. Three kids fell in the two heats before the one that we ran. But I can’t even begin to tell you how special it was for a lot of the kids. And they ate it up. It was tremendous."
All of the girls’ races took place last Thursday. The Lady Falcons ran 54.95 in the 100 dash, and 4:14.04 in the 4×400. The latter squad was just three tenths of a second out of a medal finish. The only disappointment came in the 4×800 where the girls posted a 10:11.37.
"We had a rough time in the 4×800," Stonaker said. "It’s a shame. We qualified this time, and the health of our team was not very good that day. I really debated back and forth whether to go into it or not. But it’s so rare to get accepted to run the 800 there that I took a shot, and it just didn’t work out. We didn’t run well."
After having two dual meets this week, the Falcons will get ready for the GMC Championships, which are scheduled for Tuesday and Wednesday of next week at South Brunswick High School. The meet begins at 3:45 P.M. both days.

