ARCHIVE

League within league fits nicely in schedule

Sports reporter

When the Marion High School track season begins April 1 with a home meet, the Warriors will be competing in their first Central Kansas Track League meet or, CKTL.

These meets, which only run on Tuesdays, have been on the MHS schedule now for more than 20 years.

That means the Warriors, in a way, are competing in a league within their actual league, the Mid-Central Activities Association.

There are no standings in the CKTL, instead it is a group of 20 high school across the central region of the state that are grouped with four other schools each Tuesday in April for a separate CKTL meet.

Some schools send their entire varsity team to each meet, some make it a "junior varsity" meet, while others do both.

"It wasn't really intended for that," MHS activities director Tod Gordon said of making it a junior varsity meet.

But they are a good way to prepare for the larger, Friday meets, and some coaches like to have their younger and inexperienced athletes compete without the older, experienced ones.

Gordon said the CKTL works perfect for the 20 schools who are looking to fill Tuesday night events.

He said those schools would be competing against each other anyway because of location, so the league makes perfect sense.

"It really is a good deal for all of us," he said.

Gordon said there is no contract with belonging to the CKTL, but he doesn't know why any of the 20 schools, four of which just joined this year, would drop out.

"I don't know what the schools would do if they left," he said, referring to filling up their Tuesday nights.

Marion actually will host three of the events starting April 1 with their home meet.

Herington and Centre, who do not have a track facility, will have their home meets on the 8th and 15th at Marion's track.

Quantcast