Manchester Track Team Soars Up the State Power Rankings After a Strong 2nd Place Finish at Ocean County Championships
Courtesy of Manchester XC Twitter (left to right) Jared Ellis, Tyrone Benjamin, Mubaraq Aderogba, and Joe Kurak.
May 30, 2023
For the past couple of years Manchester Township has been one of the stronger track teams in both the Shore Conference and the state. The Hawks rolled through their B-South division for the third year in a row, going 7-0.
But is this the best Manchester team since 1996? The Hawks are led by Senior captains Will
Freeman, Nick Loffredo, Tyrone Benjamin, and Mubaraq Aderogba, who all look to compete at the college level next year.
The Junior captains are Joseph Kurak, Brian Swain, and Vander McFarland. The Hawks won another sectional championship in the winter for the second straight year, with this incredible Manchester team being the 12th best team in the state.Now they look to win another this June.
Their latest competition was The Bill Bruno Ocean County Championships on Thursday, May 11 and Saturday, May 13. The Hawks showed their strength. Although Manchester came shy of first place, they should not be disappointed with their incredible performance. Manchester scored in almost every event, giving them a total of 107 points.
Manchester came first in the 4×100 relay with a time of 42.98 breaking their 43.54 school record from last year by almost a second. Junior, Joey Kurak, the third leg of the first place 4×100, put up 24 points, finished second in the 110 hurdles, 5th in the 400 hurdles, and 4th in the 200.
About his goals coming into the meet, Kurak said, “Honestly I wasn’t expecting to do as well as I did in the 200, but my goal was to come top 6 and score in all my events.”
The biggest performance of the week came from Brown University commit Mubaraq Aderogba as he took the meet by storm and earned 30 out of 107 of those points.
Aderogba broke Manchester’s school record on his first jump in the long jump and became first in New Jersey with a mark of 23 feet and 8 inches. His other gold came from the Triple Jump with a mark of 46 ‘5 which put him second in the state. Aderogba finished this meet with three golds and solidified himself as a top athlete in the state.
Manchester looks to keep adding to this historic season as they are getting ready to compete for a South Jersey Group 2 state title this June.
