Hickenbottom leads Hebron to top of PCC

Updated: May 10, 2011 10:54PM

It all hit Paige Hickenbottom. The heat. The adrenaline. The fatigue.

After the Hebron senior completed her final event at the Porter County Conference girls track meet Tuesday at Kouts, she started wobbling like a top.

Longtime Hawks coach and athletic director Rhonda Walker insisted that her athlete eat an orange to get the blood-sugar going. But Hickenbottom fought her coach at first, saying that the red-colored fruit was in fact a grapefruit and was “gross.” Eventually she relented.

“I think the heat got her, the heat was hard on a lot of them,” Walker said of the temperature that hovered in the mid-80s. “She didn’t want to eat it, but that’s when I get to be the mom and say, ‘Tough.’ ”

And after picking up four of her team’s five first-place finishes and helping the Hawks to a fourth consecutive PCC crown, that moment is surely acceptable. Hebron beat runner-up Morgan Township 155-116.

Hickenbottom won the 200 (27.29) and 400 dash (1:01.89), was the fourth leg in a successful 1,600 relay bid and took the long jump (16-4.5). Her first event, the long jump, was a boost for the running contests.

“It got my heart rate pumping, it got my adrenaline going,” Hickebottom said. “Just keep forward and keep pumping, keeping forward and fly.”

The Cherokees also had five firsts on the day, but had three second-place finishes to Hebron’s five. Morgan’s Trina Coleman excelled in the field, with wins the 100 hurdles (16.40) and high jump (5-4). Morgan has two girls named Jasmine Turner, one’s a senior and one’s a sophomore, and both contributed two wins.

“I kind of did bad in the blocks, but I pushed myself as hard as I could,” said the sophomore Turner of her 13.22 finish in the 100 dash.

Third-place Boone Grove (96) was led by usual suspect Jordan Chester. The senior finished out her final conference meet as the Mental Attitude Award winner and took home four titles in the process: 800 (2:24.28), 1,600 (5:30.14) 3,200 (12:37.82) and the 3,200 relay (the final leg). Chester was happy with her PR-tying time in the 800, but said the longer events weren’t her best.

“With the heat and humidity with the mile and two-mile, they weren’t my best,” she said.

“I’ve been told that I should run the 800 more often, but I never really listened to anybody, but I’m definitely considering it for college.”

As Hebron heads into the KV Sectional, where the Hawks had their strongest finish last year — a point off the lead — Walker isn’t presumptuous.

“We also know there’s a lot of tough teams in that sectional and spreading them (points) out,” she said. “You never look past anybody and we know that we have a lot of tough competition.”

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