The Oak Harbor High School NJROTC drill and rifle teams finished the regular season with outstanding performances at the final nine-team Olympic Division meet at Marysville-Pilchuck High School Saturday, Feb. 23.
Next up is the regional meet at Graham Kapowsin High School Saturday, March 16. At regional, Oak Harbor will face the best of the three divisions, 32 schools in all. The regional teams represent Navy, Army, Air Force and Marine Corps JROTC and are located from Oak Harbor to Oregon City, Ore.
In the team competition at Marysville-Pilchuck, Oak Harbor earned firsts from the armed drill team, rifle team No. 1 and physical strength No. 1.
Color guard No. 1, color guard No. 2, unarmed drill team and rifle team No. 2 picked up seconds, and physical strength No. 2 was third.
Oak Harbor also grabbed four individual firsts: Robert Simmons, armed drill down; Jason Salas, rifle; Mariel Empinado, ironwoman; and David Kusnick, ironman.
Oak Harbor dominated the 59-person rifle competition. Following Salas were Haruka Earney in second and Angela Morse in third. Wiatt Charlesworth was sixth.
Other individual placers included Therese Desquitado, second, unarmed commander; Devin Peterson and Sean Crosby, second, dual armed exhibition drill; Peterson, third, armed commander; Tricia Desquitado, third, ironwoman; Rebecca Holloman, fifth, ironwoman; Jermin Abides, fifth, ironman; Crosby, fifth, individual armed exhibition drill; and Jarik Bainco, sixth, ironman.
In the final divisional standings, all 10 Oak Harbor teams placed in the top four and qualified for the regional meet. Three of the Wildcat teams took conference titles: armed drill, rifle team No. 1 and color guard No. 1.
Finishing second were unarmed drill, color guard No. 2, rifle team No. 2, dual armed exhibition drill, and physical strength No. 1.
Individual armed exhibition drill and physical strength No. 2 placed third.