Correspondent photo / Lowell Spencer. Fitch's Deonte Stallings (right) completes during the Mahoning County Championships on Saturday.

AUSTINTOWN — The Austintown Fitch track team is looking to improve throughout the course of the 2024 track season, and with junior hurdler Deonte Stallings, the Falcons are well on their way to achieving that mission.

The Fitch boys team placed second at the Mahoning County Track and Field Championships on Saturday afternoon, just behind first-place Boardman. The Spartans won the meet’s Division I boys team title with 171 points, while the Falcons came up just short with 165.

However, the Fitch girls team won the meet team title with 160.50 points — ahead of the Spartans, which finished with 156.50 points on the day.

“This is my junior year, and it’s the first meet this year to perform and show my home audience what I can do,” Stallings said. “As a team, we have been down a little bit. At Salem, we didn’t win, and we felt like we should have won that meet. So, coming in here we needed to get our confidence back up. This was what was needed as a team.”

With less than ideal conditions for the meet, Stallings pointed to the past week of practice as a key as to why the Falcons were able to perform the way they did.

“This week in practice, we knew it wasn’t going to be a great day,” Stallings said. “We were outside every day in 50-degree, 40-degree weather to be out here and perform at our best. Practice makes perfect, so practicing in weather like this you wil help you perform well in weather like this.”

Stallings won the 110m hurdles, and then pulled off the double by also capturing the 300m hurdles.

“At the start, I got out of the box well. I knew that it was my race and I just had to run,” Stallings said. “Throughout the hurdles, I knew I had it won, but I had to maintain my speed. Then at the end of the race, I started falling down. I stumbled a little bit, but I maintained control and finished the race pretty good.”

His finish time of 15.06 was ahead of Falcons teammate Josh Cayson, who took second with a mark of 15.35. Stallings’ time not only won the event, but is also currently one of the top-50 times in the state this season.

In the 300m hurdles, Stallings held off Boardman hurdlers Ethan Timblin and Stephen Stanford. Stallings won with a time of 42.51, while Timblin and Stanford recorded personal best times of 44.48 and 44.91.

“My coach Myron Anderson told me to get out good with my acceleration, and I did what he asked,” Stallings said. “The last couple of hurdles, things started breaking down, but I felt like I performed the way I needed to today.”

Although it was a successful day for Stallings, he recognized that he will need to continue to work on his races and improve as the track season progresses.

“I need to work on my 110 finish,” he said. “But come time for county and (conference) events, I feel that I will be running well.”

Stallings added, “the main goal is to go to state and to get on the podium. But also, to be a regional final winner in the 110 and 300.”

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