SCRANTON — Wyoming Area’s Luke Kopetchny and Josh Mruk each won a title and added second medal in Class 3A boys during the District 2 Track and Field Championships Monday at Tuesday at Memorial Stadium.
Pittston Area’s Lucas LoPresto and Wyoming Area’s Ben Gravine will join Kopetchny and Mruk in the Pennsylvania Interscholastic Athletic Association Championships at Shippensburg University Friday and Saturday after meeting the PIAA’s challenging, qualifying standards.
Kopetchny, the top seed in the event, won the long jump Tuesday with a leap of 22-4½ after going 45-2¼ Monday to place third in the triple jump and clinch his trip to Shippensburg in the process.
“I’m definitely excited because I also qualified for triple jump, too,” said Kopetchny, a junior who has received all-state honors for his play on the basketball court and football field. “I feel like it will be a good experience for me. It’s my first time.”
Mruk also secured his state berth Monday, winning the shot put in dominant fashion with a distance of 54-4¼. He took fifth in the javelin with a throw of 175-7.
The top six in each event earned medals and the top eight scored points for their teams.
“Leading up, I was getting a little nervous, but I came through, put it out there and got the gold,” said Mruk, who had the longest four puts of the competition and had all six of his attempts among the nine in the competition that exceeded 50 feet.
Gravine secured his chance to join them when he finished third in the discus with a throw of 160-11. He also placed eighth in the shot put with 44-8¾.
Nicholas Kondrosky was fourth, right behind Kopetchny, in the triple jump with 44-6.
Jack Gravine took eighth in the 100-meter dash in 11.63.
The Warriors came out of the first day in fifth place in the team standings, but slipped to seventh with 43 points.
Dallas won with 100 points, 15½ more than Wallenpaupack.
Pittston Area was eighth out of 17 teams with 35 points after climbing six spots on the second day.
LoPresto was one of three silver medalists, with a javelin throw of 189-½.
Caden Boettger was second in the 800-meter run in 1:58.89 and added a fourth-place finish in the 1600 in 4:36.08. He also anchored the 3200 relay team to fourth place in 8:22.32, following up the combination of Jake Mead, Jacob Ivey and Brady Tucker.
Freshman Deondre Miller was second in the 100 in 11.26.
Nick Logan was seventh in the 110 high hurdles in 16.81.
KEVIN CARROLL contributed to this report.
