Owatonna Sends Seven to State Track Meet; Kubat Earns Trip with Photo Finish

Seven Owatonna athletes will compete at the state track and field meet this week at Hamline. Senior Braydon Kubat can thank current technology for his trip in the 3,200.

Huskies coach Kevin Stelter says Kubat, "ran a fantastic 3,200-meter race, ended up beating the kid from Faribault by one-one-hundredth of a second to take second place and qualify for state." Stelter says the Faribault runner had pulled away from Kubat with about 150 meters to go. "All of a sudden Braydon found a different gear and just started sprinting down to the finish line." Stelter says it was hard to tell if Kubat had caught his opponent in time. The modern version of a photo finish decided which runner advanced to state. "We were able to call it up on our technology...It's like a NASCAR race."

Kubat joins junior Dalton Kubista, who won the triple jump at the Section 1AA meet, at state for the boys events on Friday morning at Klas Stadium at Hamline University in St. Paul.

For the girls, Owatonna's 4-by-200 relay won the section crown. Freshman Sara Anderson, junior Sydney Schultz, senior Karissa Gregory and junior Margo Achterkirch make up the relay. The last three of those runners were part of the third-place 4-by-200 at last year's state meet.

Sophomore Syd Kretlow gets another chance at the 800 at state after a second-place finish at the section meet. Kretlow missed the state finals last year by four-one-thousands of a second.

Preliminaries are Friday morning in both events. View Friday's schedule. Parking can be a tricky maneuver at Hamline. Find out where and how to park.