Watts, Improving Teammates Put Taft Back in the Hunt for City Title

Three weeks ago, Taft High Coach Tom Stevenson reasoned that the Toreadors had no chance of defending the City Section track title they had won in 1986 1987.

Quincy Watts, the No. 1-ranked high school sprinter in the country by Track and Field News, had strained his right hamstring in an April 8 meet against El Camino Real and the rest of his teammates were not performing as well as expected.

“Washington’s got a lock on it,” Stevenson said. “I don’t see any team that can beat them.”

Stevenson’s statements, it should be noted, came before Watts’ return to competition for Friday’s West Valley League finals at Birmingham High. Before Watts had cruised to victories in the 200 and 400 meters, the latter in a meet-record and City-leading time of 48.05 seconds.

And before unheralded Yomo Smith had bounded 45 feet, 10 inches to win the league title in the triple jump and before Greg Sheets had cleared a personal best of 15 feet to place second in the pole vault.

Second- and third-place long jump efforts of 21-11 and 21-7 from Lawrence Killens and Darran Matthews didn’t dim Stevenson’s outlook, either.

“I think we’ve got a chance again,” Stevenson said. “It’s amazing how much our kids have improved in the last two weeks. I guess they’ve just been waiting for the league finals.”

Watts, after being sidelined for four weeks, ran conservatively in both races. His injured leg was taped and he chose not to use starting blocks in either event.

“I wasn’t needing to be pushing it real hard today,” Watts said after the 400. “I just wanted to run a balanced race the whole way. If it had felt sore or like it was going to pull, I would have just run to qualify.”

Senuhe Garrett of Reseda ran even with Watts for the first 280 meters of the 400, but then the defending state champion in the 100 and 200 shifted into overdrive and the race for first was over.

Ron Martin of Chatsworth, who won the 100 earlier, came off the turn even with Watts in the 200 but couldn’t match strides with the 6-3, 197-pound senior in the final 100.

Watts’ clocking of 21.63 in the 200 was far short of his 20.50 personal best, but he wasn’t worried.

“I’ve got some meets to run myself back into shape,” he said. “I’m only 85% fit right now.”

Watts’ return to action overshadowed a superb team effort by Chatsworth, which could possibly contend for the City title with Taft, Washington and Dorsey.

Martin and Bryan Addison each won two events and Jay Bettinger set a league meet record and personal best of 15-5 1/2 to win the pole vault.

Running into a head wind, Martin won the 100 in 11.27 and the long jump with a 22-7 effort.

Addison, runner-up in last year’s City championships in the 300-meter intermediate hurdles, won that event in 39.64 and the 110-meter high hurdles in 14.96.

“I want to win the City title in the 300s this year,” Addison said. “I think I can run at least 37.9 with the right competition to push me.”

Sheets pushed Bettinger to his City-leading mark. The two rivals are now the No. 1- and 2-ranked vaulters in the City.

Chaka Milby of Cleveland won the shotput with a personal best of 55-11, another City-leading mark.

In the girls’ meet, El Camino Real won every running event from the 200-meter dash to the 3,200-meter run.