Avon, Canton athletes earn top five finishes at State Open

Through the years, a majority of participants at the CIAC State Open from the Avon High track and field program has been individuals.

There have been relay teams from Avon participating but seldom have they finished with a medal.

That changed on Saturday when Avon’s 4×800 meter relay team finished fifth – the first Avon relay team to medal at the State Open in 50 years at Willow Brook Stadium in New Britain.

Two Avon athletes finished third with Logan Murray taking third in the 300 hurdles and Braham Bulow finishing third in the 3,200 meters. They helped the Falcons finish 13th at the Open with 16 points – their highest finish since finishing ninth in 2016.

Canton’s Lucy O’Connor finished in a five-way tie for second place in the high jump while teammate Kayla Berning finished eighth in the triple jump.

Avon’s 4×800 meter relay team (Brahm Bulow, Chris Campbell, Riley Klotz and Andrew Kessler) finished third a week ago at the Class MM championships with a time of 8:10. On Saturday, they ran a school-record time of 8:01.81 to finish fifth and secure a berth at next week’s New England championship meet in Maine.

The top six finishers in each event qualify for the New England meet at Noble High in North Berwick, Maine on Saturday, June 13.

Avon finished just 0.66 of a second behind Amity in fourth place. Greenwich won the 4×800 by nearly eight seconds with a time of 7:46.62.

The last Avon relay team to win a medal at the State Open came in 1976 when Andrew Kutz, Harold Hackbarth, John Breeden and Craig Hackbarth finished fourth in the 4×440 yard relay.

The old school record in the 4×800 relay (8:02.93) was set ago at the 2025 State Open by Kessler, Campbell, Aiden McLaughlin and Will Lancaster.

Bulow, who won the Class MM title a week ago, had a season-best time of 9:21.70 to finish third in 3,200 meters. Griswold’s Tycen LaBelle won the race in 9:14.40 with Amity’s Luke Cushing finishing second in 9:18.70.

A week after winning the Class MM state title, Murray broke his own school record in the 300 hurdles at the Open with his time of 38.43 seconds, good enough for third place.  Bloomfield’s Javonni Reynolds won in 37:01 with Coginchaug’s Charles Dalles finishing second in 37.34 seconds.

The two third place medals were the best performance at the State Open for the Falcons since Geoff Kirk won the shot put and discus in 2016.

For the Avon girls, Kathryn Martin finished eighth in the 400 meters with a new school record time of 58.20. Teammate Lauren Edge finished 11^th in the 100 hurdles with a time of 15.78 seconds.

Newington’s Margaret Krusewski won the high jump with a leap of 5-foot-4 while Canton’s Lucy O’Connor was one of five girls to finish tied for second with leaps of 5-2.

O’Connor, Grasso Tech’s Alyssa Lombardi, Bolton’s Alexa Flores, Suffield’s Ayden Darvil and New Fairfield’s Maddox Perrett each cleared 5-2 with no misses. Only Krusewski was able to clear 5-4.

O’Connor, who won the Class S title in the high jump with a leap of 5-3 on Monday, returns to the New England championships for the second straight year.

Berning jumped farther than she did on Monday when she won a Class S in the triple jump, but finished eighth at the State Open. She jumped 35-8.75 on Monday and leaped 36-2 feet on Saturday.

2026 State Open championships results (Athletic.net)