A'town girls track and field team anticipates sectional meet "The majority of our athletes are younger, but the top point scorers have been the upperclassmen." - Jackie Mulryne, Allentown High School girls track and field coach BY DOUG McKENZIE Staff Writer They say you should not judge a book by its cover. In sports, you should not judge a team by its record. A case in point - the 4-4 Allentown High School girls track and field team. While the Lady Redbirds may be a .500 team on paper, they have certainly performed more like one of the better teams in what is a talent-rich Colonial Valley Conference this season. And their success has spread outside of their conference meets as well, like at the Long Branch Relays, where Allentown was the top girls team in a strong field. "That was really a great day for the girls," said head coach Jackie Mulryne. "We came home with 63 medals and every single girl that competed won a medal." While that day in Long Branch may have been the highlight of the season thus far, Allentown has been solid throughout the season, even in defeat. "The meets we've lost have been very close meets for the most part," Mulryne said. "Several of those meets could have gone either way. Hopewell Valley is just a dominant team this year, so that one wasn't close, but the three meets with Notre Dame, Trenton and Princeton were close. The Trenton meet came down to the (4x400) relay, and they just beat us that day. We beat them at the Penn Relays in that event though." It all adds up to a .500 record that doesn't do the Redbirds justice. "It is deceiving, when you look at what they've accomplished already," Mulryne said. "They just continue to break school records and get better and better. The CVC is just really strong this year." The Redbirds' success does not come as a surprise to Mulryne. "It's about what I expected from this group," she said. Allentown, which was scheduled to compete against New Egypt and Bordentown on Tuesday, has a mixed roster that is both deep and talented. "The majority of our athletes are younger, but the top point-scorers have been the upperclassmen," Mulryne said. "We've got four seniors who all score points for us, and three of them have been dominant this year." Rachel Scheuerman is one of them, having excelled both on and off the track. "She has been steadily progressing in a number of events," the coach said. "On Wednesday (against Robbinsville), she tied the school record in the 100 (12.6), broke the school record in the 200 (25.9), jumped 16-10 in the long jump and ran a 60-second split in the 4x400 relay. So she had a great day." On Saturday, at the Mercer County Championships, Scheuerman took third in both the 100 and the 200, while running a 59-second split in the relay. Senior Quiana Volney has also had a strong season competing in the 400 and the intermediate hurdles, finishing sixth in the county in the hurdles (67.5) and seventh in the 400 (61.5). She also competes in the relay. "She's also a strong jumper for us, jumping over 32 feet in the triple jump, which was good for seventh in the county," Mulryne said. And then there's senior Brittany O'Brien, who was inflicted with an illness in the beginning of her freshman year, which kept her from competing in the track events. "She's really a unique athlete," Mulryne said. "All through her childhood she was a fast runner, and then she gets to high school and she gets diagnosed with this illness that keeps her from running with the treatment she was under." By her sophomore season though, O'Donnell was able to run again, and there's been no looking back for the speedy senior. "She really went through a lot," her coach said. "I give her a lot of credit, and what she went through really made her a stronger person." While O'Donnell now competes in the 100, 200 and the relay, her illness led to her learning to compete in the throwing events, where she has done very well. "She threw 96-3 in the discus and 34- 1.5 in the shot put (against Robbinsville), so she's really come a long way," Mulryne said. Senior Denise Winkle is another strong thrower for the Redbirds in both the javelin and the discus, as is junior Beatrice Pesciotta, who took third in the county in the javelin (reaching 110 feet) and sixth in the discus (99- 10). At the county meet, Winkle and Pesciotta broke the school record when they combined to throw over 200 feet. Junior Mary Sancilo is the team's top high jumper, finishing fifth in the county (5-0), after recently jumping 5-4 for the first time. However, even with all the success the Redbirds have had in the field events, Mulryne is most excited about what she's seen on the track. "One of our weaknesses has always been in the distance events," she said. "Other programs in the CVC have dedicated runners who run the distance events year-round, and it's always been a challenge to us to not give up those 27 points each meet. This year we have some young runners who have shown some great potential." Sophomore Krista Bonham has made a smooth transition from the high jump to the 800 and intermediate hurdles. "Krista was a 2:35 in the 800 recently, which we're really excited about because before this year we didn't have anybody running under 3:00," Mulryne said. Freshman Bridgette Meloro also ran a 2:35, while fellow freshman Caitlin Hickse ran a 2:39. "And all three of those girls compete in other events for us as well," the coach said. Sophomore Amanda Bader is another distance runner who has performed very well in the mile and the 800. "We're expecting big things from her over the next few years," Mulryne said. The shuttle hurdles relay team of sophomore Morgan Marsciano, Bonham, sophomore Janice Duko and junior Nicki Galipo have broken the school record twice, while the 4x200 relay team of Scheuerman, Brittany O'Brien and her sister Samantha (a sophomore who also finished sixth in the pole vault at the county meet), and freshman Haley Ostrander has also performed well. "It really is a nice mix of underclassmen that show quite a bit of talent and the dominant leadership of the upperclassmen," Mulryne said. On Friday, Allentown hopes to make some noise at the freshman/sophomore championships at Hopewell Valley, while the entire Allentown team is looking forward to the Central Jersey Group II sectional meet the following weekend. "We expect to do well there, being a Group II school once again," Mulryne said. "Unfortunately, the state (Group II) final is the following weekend in Egg Harbor, which is the same night as our senior/junior prom in Princeton. There is a definite conflict there for some of our top girls, but to ask them to miss their prom? I can't ask that of them. "But we're just going to take it one step at a time for now and enjoy ourselves," the coach added. "We'll worry about that weekend when we get there." Truth be told, the Allentown girls don't need a strong showing at the Group II meet to have a successful season. They've already accomplished that, no matter what the final results say on paper.