Arlington School & Family Magazine November/December 2015 | Page 13

Seguin Girls Track: Ringing in a State Title It’s hard enough to win a state track and field championship with an army of skilled performers spread out over a number of events. So what the Seguin girls’ track squad did last May was quite extraordinary. They won it all with just four girls. The teammates – Tonea Marshall, Toni Garrett, Lateria Gooding and Aubrey Ridgeway – slipped on their Class 5A girls championship rings in front of the entire school during a thundering pep rally ceremony in the school gym earlier this semester. While the pep rally centered around the football team’s big game the next day, the Runnin’ Cougars grabbed the center of attention. “They look nice, huh?” Seguin track and field coach Renwick Ridgeway said of the rings. Seguin tallied 54 points, beating out second-place Fort Bend Bush (34 points). “What’s so exciting about all this is not just that we won with four runners but this is the first state title as a team for the school,” said Marshall, who ended the meet with four medals. She finished the hurdle event in 13.55 seconds, just missing the state record of 13.51. “I don’t know if we thought at the start of the season we could win all of it,” Garrett said. “But as we got closer, we didn’t think about that, we just concentrated on winning every event we were in.” The 2016 season has yet to begin, but Seguin will certainly be the team to beat. All four girls return for their senior year. “No pressure,” Ridgeway said. “We’ll just go out and do what we did last year, which is give it our best in every event in every meet. What happens, happens.” † The quartet won the 4x200-meter relay and finished second in the 4x100. Marshall won silver in the long jump and took home the gold medal in the 100-meter hurdles. November/December 2015 - Arlington School & Family 11