Timberlake boys finish third in 3A with four state champs

MIDDLETON - Led by Ben Austin, who was a part of three state championships, the Timberlake boys finished third in the state 3A track and field meet on Saturday at Middleton High.

The Tigers were six points away from the team title, as Sugar-Salem won with 87 points and runner-up Weiser had 85. Timberlake had 81.

Austin won the 300-meter intermediate hurdles with a time of 40.38 seconds. He was also part of a winning 4x200 relay team (1:32.23) which also featured Austin Malloy, Quinton Reece and Daniel Buck. Austin capped his day off on a state title-winning 4x400 relay squad (3:29.46), which included Preston Rhodes, Josh Lampert and Buck.

"He ran fantastic races and had a very big week," Timberlake coach Brian Kluss said. "He was the class of the meet. Our relays, we won handily in both relay races. It was a great performance by our relay kids. There are lots of things that can go wrong, and they stepped up today."

Kluss was pleased with the results his boys displayed.

"I thought we had a great meet," Kluss said. "We finished third. We would've liked to have finished higher, but overall I thougth our kids performed very well. A couple of teams had an awesome meet. We had tons of PRs and we won (several events)."

Preston Rhodes won the pole vault Friday at 14 feet.

"Preston was 14 feet clean without any misses," Kluss said. "He attempted 14-6 but just missed it."

Rhodes was third last year in the pole vault.

Sugar-Salem also won the girls team title.

2A: Luke Feasline won the boys shot put for St. Maries with a throw of 50 feet, 10 1/2 inches, repeating as champion. Logan Feasline was third with a throw of 47-8 3/4 for the Lumberjacks, who finished 10th.

Declo (boys) and Nampa Christian (girls) won team titles.

1A: Clark Fork senior Brennan Brooks cleared 13-6 in the pole vault to win the state title in the pole vault, edging Kootenai senior Carter Napierala, who finished second on attempts after both reached the mark.

Lighthouse Christian (boys) and Liberty Charter (girls) won team titles.