Calabar planned to win big - Hawes

Following last year's narrow three-point escape, Omar Hawes, assistant coach of Boys' Champs kingpins Calabar, noted that the team was in no mood for another Saturday evening scrap and was determined to secure a dominant win this time around.

Hawes hailed his team's latest Mortimer Geddes Trophy triumph as a great victory and shared that this year's 90.5 points win over second-place Kingston College (KC) was the result of year-long planning and execution.

Calabar secured a surprise three-point win over KC in 2017, but was ruthless this time around, ending on 368.50 points to their opponent's 278. Jamaica College was third on 224.50; St Jago, 146; STETHS, 95; and Wolmer's, 94.50; rounding out the top six.

"This victory is a great one, one that we would have planned for. From we left Champs last year, we planned that we wanted to have a big victory this time around and it worked well for us. We knew that we were on target for a massive win leading up to the championships, as the boys were in prime form and we were not surprised by this big margin of victory", said Hawes.

KEY PLAYERS

Despite some hiccups on the way with team mishaps in the relays and injuries to key players, Hawes stated that he was not surprised by the high number of points his team ended with after the five days.

"It was not a matter of expectation, it was a matter of execution and once the boys executed on the days, we knew that we would have had a big margin over our opponents", he added.

There were many outstanding performances from the Red Hills Road-based team and he was asked which performances stood out best for him.

"The 5000 metres was a pretty decent one, Anthony Carpenter getting two personal bests, Tyreke Wilson winning back the 100 metres after doing so in Class Three and the 39.17 seconds by our Class One 4x100 metre relay team without several of our main players. Generally, it was indeed a good all-round effort," he continued.

Hawes spoke about the plans they had in Kevroy Venson beating Kingston College's top man Aryamanya Rodgers in the 5000 metre.

SOMETHING SPECIAL

"At the first meet we had in December when Kevroy (Venson) ran the 5000 metres, we realised based on the time, that he had the class to do something special and once some more work was put in, he could challenge Rodgers, even though they ran the race a lap short. Like he did last year in the 1500 metres, he just stayed with Rodgers because once they were close in the final lap, we knew that he had the sprint to pull away from him," Hawes added.

After seeing his team going seven straight and knowing that Kingston College had won the championships for 14 years in a row, Hawes noted that with continued effective management and coaching, his team is capable of continued dominance.

"The future for Calabar looks bright and if we continue to coach and manage the way we have done for the past seven years, I see no reason why we can't get what is there for us in numbers. We are not going to put a figure on it, but I know at this point we have a good wealth of talent at Calabar ... next year it could also be eight in a row," said Hawes.