Jan Brito ’23
Derby High School’s indoor track team ended this season in a successful and satisfying way. The team is one of the best in the region and even in the nation. While this year the majority of the team was young, with only a few seniors, the team was well-disciplined and committed. While the team faced some obstacles and didn’t reach the goal they set for themselves, they still did a great job getting respectable scores.
Coach Nick Diluggo started coaching in 2008, making this his fifteenth year at Derby High School. According to Diluggo, he started coaching because he ran track in high school and he himself enjoys running track. Assistant Coach Matt Nicolari, who in his DHS student days was coached by coach Diluggo, has been coaching at DHS for five years now. He became a coach because he wanted to give back to the school that taught him so much.
The seasons for both the girls and boys teams were great. In the words of Diluggo,“The season went really well; both the girls and boys team showed a lot of improvement. We had a lot of individual successes in the season, so we’re pretty happy with how it went.” Nicolari also sees a lot of improvement in the team: “In a short span of time we see kids grow, especially the new ones. The freshmen go from never having competed before to putting up times that are respected in the state.”
When asked about specific athletes that made great improvements, some names that came up were Bryan McLean ‘24 and Carlos Allen ‘23. Nicolari said, “These athletes went from being some of the best in the state to some of the best in the region. Bryan might even be one of the best in the nation!”
Apart from Diluggo and Nicolari seeing great improvement and discipline in the new and recurrent players, Diluggo said he thought the team did great. He told the Raider Press, “our boy’s team is prone to win the league in our class. We didn’t win either this year but we finished in the top three in our league and top five in our class. We are pretty happy with that.” He continued showing how proud he was of the girls team as he said, “We were top five in our league, so we’re pretty happy with that.”
Nicolari addresses the comparison between indoor track and cross country that people make by saying, “In indoor track there are a lot more events. While we still have distance events, the distance we run in indoor track is a little less than cross country. The indoor track also has things like long jump, hurtling, polevault, shot put, and others.”
Student athlete Colin Strickland ’23 says he felt the season went very well. He feels he, along with other players, continue to improve in different aspects. He said, “Me, for example, last year I was horrible at long jumping but this year I’ve gotten pretty good.” However, he also said, “We could’ve done better towards the end but a lot of people started to get injured or get in trouble, which made us lose a few key players.”
When asked about how the team made their wins, Alyssa Mcarthy ‘23 said she thought they did great individually. In her words, “Indoor track doesn’t have many team events.” She advises the incoming indoor track team to prepare their bodies and minds because high school track isn’t as easy as middle school.
Even with the obstacle of losing key players, both Colin Strickland and Alyssa McCarthy agreed that the environment at practices and meets are friendly and inviting. They along with the coaches agreed it was an overall successful season with individual wins. Indoor track not only did a great job ranking top 5 in the league and in the class but according to the coaches, all players put work towards accomplishing their goals.
The Raider Press 