The Red Devilettes will hit the starting line for the Class AA girls race at 10:45 a.m. on the Carrollton City Schools campus, and first-year Bowdon coach Jeremiah Yates is looking forward to seeing his team compete on the state’s biggest stage.
“I think they’ll do well. All season long, they have improved every meet that we’ve ran in. Their times have improved, they all had personal-best records at region and I think that’ll continue. I think they’ll do better at state than they did at region. So I think they’ll do well,” Yates said.
Bowdon finished in third place at the Region 5-AA Championships last Wednesday at McIntosh Reserve in Whitesburg, trailing only Bremen and Jordan, respectively.
At region, Molly Harper led Bowdon with a ninth-place finish in 24 minutes and 55.24 seconds, followed by Victoria Johnson in 19th (26:44.33), Whitney McClure in 20th (26:47.17), Jena Lane in 24th (27:51.41) and Hailey Jordan in 27th (28:45.85).
That same quintet will line up against the state’s best Saturday as the first group of Bowdon girls to run in the GHSA championships, something Yates said will serve as a special reward to close out a strong season.
“It actually means a lot to them. They’re really excited about it, especially the seniors that have been here four years. They were really trying to stress to the younger ones how important it was and how much it meant. So they’re really excited about it,” Yates said. “The younger ones, they really didn’t know what to expect coming in, either. But they’re pretty excited about it and looking forward to the rest of their time here.”
And in his first season in charge of the program, Yates has been encouraged by the direction it’s heading and is hopeful of a strong showing on Saturday.
“It’s been pretty exciting, actually. I’ve enjoyed it. Coming in not really knowing what to expect or knowing the kids, I’ve come in and really had a good time with it this year,” Yates said.
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