Taft Should Run Up Score, Repeat as City Champion

There will be no 120-point total for the Taft High boys’ track and field team in the City Section championships at Birmingham High today, but the Toreadors should still win their second consecutive title.

Kenny Mitchell, Taft’s talkative sprint coach, predicted before the season that Taft would score a monstrous 120 points in the City meet while romping to the team title.

A 70- or 80-point total appears more realistic for the Toreadors, and that would give them a 20- or 30-point margin of victory over Birmingham and Cleveland, who are expected to be their closest pursuers.

The meet starts with field events at 3:30 p.m. Running events start at 5:30.

The top three finishers in each event will qualify for the state championships at Hughes Stadium in Sacramento on June 1-2, as will any finisher who meets a specific qualifying standard.

Chris Morgan, Daniel Clements and Noah Smith are expected to lead Taft.

Morgan, defending state champion in the 110-meter high hurdles and the state leader at 13.90, is favored to win his second consecutive title in that event and his third in a row in the long jump.

The Arizona State-bound Morgan will run the second leg on a 400 relay team that has timed a co-state leading 41.30 and could finish among the top four in the 100.

Clements, who has signed with UCLA, is expected to win the 1,600 if he has recovered from last Thursday’s City preliminaries, where he sustained two blisters and a cut on his left foot after running most of his heat without a shoe.

Clements’ shoe came off about 300 meters into the race when a competitor inadvertently stepped on the back of his foot.

The injuries forced him to withdraw from a heat of the 3,200, a race he was favored to win.

He hasn’t run since the preliminaries in an effort to heal but has been riding a stationary bike and lifting weights to maintain his fitness.

“I’m definitely going to run as hard as I can [today],” he said. “There’s no question about that.”

Smith, a sophomore, is expected to finish in the top three in the 100 and 200, and run the anchor leg on the 400 relay. He might replace Tyrone Melton as Taft’s anchor runner in the 1,600 relay because Melton has complained of leg pain this week.

John Walker will pace Birmingham and Jason Lovell will lead Cleveland.

Walker, who will attend USC on a football scholarship, could finish among the top three in the high hurdles and 300 intermediate hurdles. He will also compete in the long jump and run on the No. 2-seeded 400 relay team.

Lovell, who has signed with Texas Tech, is the state leader in the 400 at 47.58 and is favored to win his second consecutive title in that event.

He will run the anchor leg on the top-seeded 1,600 relay team.

Senior Chris Wells-Anders of El Camino Real is heavily favored to win his second consecutive title in the 800.