LAKEWOOD | Only one athlete at the three-day Class 5A boys state track meet won more than one individual state title and that honor belonged to an Aurora area standout.
Eaglecrest senior Cameron Bell earned the distinction as the lone multiple-event state winner when he captured the 300 meter hurdles on Saturday at Jefferson County Stadium to pair with the long jump crown he claimed two days earlier.
Bell’s two titles were highlights of an outstanding meet for local programs, which included a combined total of six individual and relay state championships.
Cherokee Trail had its streak of three straight 5A team titles snapped by a Fort Collins team that garnered a whopping 99 points, but coach Chris Faust’s Cougars still managed to finish as the runner-up with 59 of their own, which was aided by three state titles.
Senior Prince David Ajibade earned the first gold for Cherokee Trail in Friday’s high jump competition — which he took with a top mark of 6 feet, 7 inches — while sophomore Joshua Stewart opened the final day of the meet by winning the 110 meter hurdles.
Stewart and Denver East’s Mulyndwa Kafuuma were hurdle-for-hurdle and stride-for-stride to the finish line and had to wait for several minutes to find out who crossed first. It turned out to be Stewart, who ran 13.68 to edge Kafuuma by just 0.10 of a second.
In the final event of the meet — the 4×400 meter relay — Cherokee Trail needed just a top-five finish to hold off Northfield for second place and did much more than that.
Second initially when senior anchor Dylan Smith crossed the finish line, the Cougars (with a team rounded out by juniors William Mines, Cooper Adams and Austin Eravelly) ended up as state champions when Mountain Vista was disqualified for a lane violation. Cherokee Trail ran 3:20.04 to win the event for a second straight season.
The last Aurora area state championship made history, as senior Joshua Gallien became the first boys state winner in Vista PEAK Prep program history. The girls team had two previous state event winners — Maya Evans won the long jump in 2015 and Raina Branch took the high jump in 2019 — but Gallien reached unchartered territory for the boys with this victory in the 400 meters.
Gallien made a short turnaround after he placed seventh in the 100 meter dash and he finished atop a talented field with a time of 47.03 seconds. He finished the season undefeated in the event and he also placed fifth in the 200 meters.
Courtney Oakes is Aurora Sentinel Sports Editor. Reach him at sports@sentinelcolorado.com. Twitter/X: @aurorasports. IG: Sentinel Prep Sports
