Warren G. Harding's girls track and field team.
The Raiders have won three of the last five Trumbull County Track and Field Meets, including the last two.
This year, Harding is very solid in the sprints - especially the 4x200-meter relay. WGH was the top-ranked team in the state, coming into this year's state indoor meet in Akron.
The Raiders even won in that event at this year's prestigious Mehock Relays, which are held at Ashland University.
Alexandra Allen has won her fair share of 100 and 300 hurdles titles and Alexis Simpson and Aminah Wesley are very solid in the sprints.
Those are just a few names on this very talented WGH team, which will most likely be its own best competition heading into Tuesday's meet. A few finals and running semifinals are Tuesday, while the meet wraps up Thursday at Lakeview High School.
"If we take care of the baton, run smart races and minimize any foolish mistakes, that's what we need to do," WGH coach Charles Penny said.
The Lakeview boys, which beat out McDonald for last year's boys title, has to have a near flawless meet to repeat from last year.
"In order for us to repeat, we're going to have some guys run the best races of their life," Lakeview boys coach Mark Swinning said. "We're kind of young this year and it's going to be an uphill struggle for us, not that it's out of the question, but we're going to have to have some guys ready to compete mentally and physically. We're going to have to have a good two-day stretch there."
McDonald, Harding, Howland and Liberty should be the favorites for this year's boys team title.
"All four of those schools will be tough to beat," Swinning said.
Penny, whose boys team won from 2001 to '02 and 2004 to '10, said Howland has the most depth.
"They have enough people that are above average that they're the best team in Trumbull County this year," Penny said.
However, John F. Kennedy won't be at full strength at Lakeview this year. Because of a scheduling conflict, a majority of the Eagles are slated to be at the North Coast League Meet in Parma those days.
JFK coach Robert Andrews said he'll send a nucleus of boys to the county meet, while the rest of the boys and the girls team are going to the NCL Meet.
Chad and Carl Zallow, Rob Seger, Zach Watt, Andre Jethroe and Zack Nicholas are going to Lakeview, representing JFK's strengths in the sprints, hurdles and relays.
"We have a pretty decent team," Andrews said of his boys team. "To have the whole team together would've been great."
Not having a full Eagles team there won't be the only new look at this year's county meet.
Lakeview has done some renovations inside Don Richards Stadium that will be noticeable. Although, some of the new looks won't be completed until this summer.
"They're working on the grass, trying to get its roots going," Swinning said. "The long jump pits and pole vault runway, they're not completely finished because they're going over it this summer, spraying that rubberized surface over the concrete so it will look just like the track when it's completely finished.
"Some of the places we've been to that have the same kind of facility that we do now, as far as the long jump pits and the runways and how the track is laid out would be like St. Thomas Aquinas and Stow."
The pole vault and long jump areas have moved from last year.
"The long jump pit is on the away side of the football field," Swinning said. "There's one near the high jump area and there is one near the pole vault area. We rotated the pole vault in front of the band shell with the pit on the visitor's side, kind of near one of the long jump pits."
Having two long jump pits helps Lakeview if the Ohio High School Athletic Association implements the triple jump. That event was closed to being passed last December.
"That was one of the things we were looking at, the ability to run the long jump and the triple jump at the same time, or if we're in a meet where we're in a time constraint, we can run both boys and girls long jump at the same time," Swinning said.
Even though the athletes won't be competing on the football field, fans and athletes can notice the improvements there as well.
"We've added some much needed remodeling as far as the long jump pit and the football field/soccer fields," Swinning said. "The way it was, it was kind of holey, but that's taken care of with the sod and the drainage system they put in."
