GIRLS’ STATE TRACK AND FIELD CHAMPIONSHIPS : Newport Harbor High Jumpers Highlight Meet

There was something that had never been done--and something else you never expected to see.

While there were no championship performances by Orange County girls at the State track and field meet Saturday at Cerritos College, there were some efforts that earned a second look.

For starters, there was the 2-3-4 finish by the Newport Harbor high jumpers, a feat that Coach Rick Foster believed has never been accomplished.

“This has never happened at a State meet,” Foster said. “Three girls from the same school, in the same event, finishing second, third and fourth. What do you figure the odds of that happening are?”

About as unusual as the finish of Christie Engesser, The Times girls’ track and field athlete of the year, in the 800 meters. Engesser was in the middle of the pack through the first lap but fell behind halfway through the second.

The leaders continued to distance themselves, and Engesser wound up with her worst race of the season, an eighth-place finish in 2 minutes 17.03 seconds. Miesha Marzell of Oakland Bishop O’Dowd won in 2:09.13.

Engesser finished second to Marzell at State last year, too, and Sherron Rhetta of Long Beach Poly defeated Engesser at the Masters meet May 28. But as recently as last weekend, Engesser won the 800 at the prestigious Golden West championships in Sacramento.

“I just didn’t have it in me,” she said. “There’s no explanation, it just wasn’t there. Some days you respond and some days you don’t. There are a lot of questions and not many answers.”

Fortuna’s Vicky Fleschner, who was fifth in the same race, comforted her future teammate--both will attend Oregon next year.

“It’s not the end of the world. There will be other races,” Fleschner said. “It was weird out there today.”

That description summed up how many of Saturday’s participants felt.

With graduation activities at their peak last week, athletes’ hearts, minds and, in several cases, bodies were elsewhere.

“Grad night we were up until 5,” Engesser said. “We stayed in the gym all night. It was great.”

It also curtailed her training, not that it was an excuse. The much-ballyhooed two-week delay of the meet affected everyone.

“It was no different for me than anyone else,” she said.

But Newport Harbor’s high jump heroics were. Foster had hoped to see a 1-2-3 finish by sophomores Tina Bowman and Misty May and senior Michaela Ross but said his girls didn’t always stick to the game plan.

“Everyone could have jumped higher,” he said. “But when they’d move to another height, they’d try to do something a little different.”

May, who hoped for a top-five finish, was second with a jump of 5 feet 10 inches, a personal best. Cate’s Tracye Lawyer was first at 5-10 with fewer misses. Bowman was third (5-9) and Ross tied for fourth (5-8).

In the 3,200, Corona del Mar freshman Kellie Campbell moved from fifth early in the race and finished second (10:55.78) to Fallbrook’s Milena Glusac, who defended her title in 10:42.68. She also won the 1,600. Canyon’s Kim Nelson (11:08.45) was fourth and Edison’s Elyse Homberger (11:09.30) was fifth.

In the 100 high hurdles, Los Alamitos’ Cavetra Mitchell bettered her third-place finish in the Masters, running second in 14.52 to Oakland Bishop O’Dowd’s Ayana Grant (14.11). Esperanza’s Carrie Caulkins was third in the 1,600 (5:01.01).

Meet notes

Long Beach Poly easily defended its team title with 56 points, followed by Oakland Bishop O’Dowd with 37 and Thousand Oaks with 30. . . . Thousand Oaks’ Marion Jones capped her career by winning the 100 and 200 for the fourth year in a row, and adding the long jump title in her first year of competition in the event, with a State-record leap of 22- 1/2.