The Tribune

By BRENT STUBBS

Senior Sports Reporter

bstubbs@tribunedia.net

FORGET about who won the Government Secondary Schools Sports Association and the Bahamas Association of Independent Secondary Schools track and field championships.

The focus is now on the joint Ministry of Youth, Sports and Culture and Bahamas Association of Athletic Associations’ National High School Track and Field Championships this weekend at Thomas A Robinson National Stadium.

The three-day event, which kicks off on Thursday and wraps up on Saturday, will not have an overall champion, but it will come down to who wins the various divisional titles as the meet will combine the junior and senior high schools.

Based on the divisions they are competing in, the CH Reeves Raptors are hoping to make as much noise as they did in winning the GSSSA junior championship with their 59-member team.

“We are competing in the under-13 and under-15 division, but we also decided to enter the under-17 division because we have some athletes who are eligible to compete in that category,” said CH Reeves’ head coach Rashad McKenzie.

“We have a lot of talent here and we also have about two athletes who have the potential to make the CARIFTA team. So we are ecstatic and we are ready to compete. We just have to wait and see how the competition goes.”

McKenzie is looking for athletes such as Melvinique Gibson, Aliyah Brown, Jay-Onn Joseph, Dashanna Curtis and Lamonte Butler to lead the way for the Raptors.

While the Raptors captured the GSSSA title by less than 100 points, McKenzie said it shows that there is stiff competition in the government schools, but they are waiting to see what they will face from the private schools. “Our strength is usually on the track, so we have the team formula and so we hope to stick to it and hopefully our field competitors will come through to help us get over the hump in the overall team standings,” McKenzie said.

It’s anticipated that the bulk of the competition will be in the high school segment where the St Augustine’s College Big Red Machine will be out to redeem itself after being dethroned by the Queen’s College Comets as the BAISS champions.

With about 90 athletes on their roster, the Big Red Machine will be out to match or surpass last year’s appearance in the Nationals when they collected six of the eight divisional titles.

“We are still battling some injuries, but we expect to continue to perform like we have done in the past,” said SAC’s head coach Jason Edwards. “Nationals is more quality over quantity, so you should see some differences in the point total and the standings.”

Edwards said despite the injuries that hampered them during the BAISS, they intent to be led by Adrian Curry, Megan Moss, Wendira Moss, Stephen Farquaharson, Joshua Miller, Jade Knowles and Anthaya Charlton, just to name a few.

“The strength of our team will be the under-20 girls, under-17 girls and boys and our bantam girls,” Edwards said. “We’ve had some injuries in our senior boys and so they are not as strong as we would like and the distance programme is where we have some issues too, but we’re working on that.”

As for the competition, Edwards expects the clash with the Comets, but when you add the other schools from around the country, there is also those diamonds in the rough that cause the upsets.

“The Family Islands have a lot of talent and a lot of people tend to overlook them,” he said. “But they always have a few athletes in their schools, who have much as much talent or more than the schools here in New Providence.

“Of course, we also have the schools coming from Grand Bahama like Tabernacle Baptist, whose boys divisions are always very strong; along with St George’s. So it’s not going to be easy, but the Big Red Machine hope to be rolling this weekend.”

While the focus for SAC will be on the divisional titles, Queen’s College head coach Everette Fraser said the nationals will be all about the athletes going after their individual national titles.

“We are not going out to try and win any overall title or anything like that. This one is all about the kids,” Fraser said. “We want them to go after their marquee events for their national titles.

“The BAISS is the meet that we really come out and compete because we have athletes from all of the different sports that make up our team. Most of those athletes have gone back to competing in their sports, so we will mainly have the track athletes who are trying to qualify for Carifta and get their national titles.”

If they win any divisional titles, they win, but Fraser said he doesn’t feel the nationals should be about winning an overall title, but rather the focus should be on the athletes achieving their individual glory.

But Fraser said the Comets will be about 100 strong and their athletes will be coming to continue what they did at the BAISS Championships as they compete

Some of the athletes to watch from Queen’s College are senior boys - Tristen Hanna, Matthew Thompson, Kendrick Major, Max Azor and Shaun Miller; senior girls - Dahja Clarke, Tyler Lightbourn, Mia Mitchell, Lyric Brennen and Keianna Carey; intermediate boys - Tyler Miller, Ahmad Evans and Jamaal Flowers; intermediate girls - Javonya Valcourt, Laila Cleare, Paige Stuart, Destiny Greenslade and Shaunece Miller; junior girls - Paige Archer, Koi Adderley, Devin Cuffy-Bethel, Tylar Miller and Nia Richards; junior boys - Kyle Bain, Matthew Chandler and Johnson; bantams - Rajae Saunders and Angelia Knowles and bantam boys - Tristan King and Kenny Moxey.

Going into the championships, Grand Bahama based Ossie ‘the Sports Insider” Simmons, have released his top seven contenders. They are as follows:

1. Queen’s College.

2. St Augustine’s College.

3. Tabernacle Baptist Academy.

4. CR Walker.

5. CI Gibson.

6. St John’s College.

7. St George’s.