Friday, March 28, 2025
Brandon Thweatt is returning to the New York State Track and Field Championships next month, and this time he will have a familiar face with him at the starting line.
After capturing the county championship six days earlier, the Baldwin junior won the 55-meter hurdles at the state qualifier on Feb. 10 by edging Hewlett’s Matt DeCicco by just .03 seconds at St. Anthony’s High School in South Huntington. Thweatt will be joined by teammate Patrick Appolon, who will be making his first trip to the state event after finishing third in the hurdles.
Also qualifying for states is the Bruins’ 4x200 relay team of seniors Prosper Prawl and Nigel Wright and juniors Darrell Turner and Mikhi Williams, who finished second at the qualifier. The state event will again take place at the Ocean Breeze Athletic Complex in Staten Island on March 8.
“It’s about execution when you get to the state qualifier,” Baldwin coach Mike Higgins said. “All of the championships, the conference championships, and the county championships are done, so they can just focus on trying to qualify in their best event and Patrick and Brandon [did it].”
Thweatt clocked a time of 7.65 seconds and Appolon completed the trip in 7.78. Both times were slightly faster than what they ran during the Nassau Class A Championships at St. Anthony’s.
“Brandon has been leading the county in the 55 hurdles all year long,” Higgins said. “It was more along the lines of he just needed to get first, second, or third, so I don’t think there was too much pressure on him.”
Thweatt failed to get out of the qualifying round during last year’s state event but finished second in his last start at Ocean Breeze on Feb. 1 with a personal-best time of 7.56 seconds. Cameron Ingram of Cicero-North Syracuse won with a state-record time of 7.18 seconds and will again be Thweatt’s top threat.
Appolon competed at Baldwin as a freshman but transferred to Holy Trinity for his sophomore year before returning to the Bruins. “He picked up where he left off,” Higgins said. “He’s progressing nicely in the hurdles, so this is his first opportunity to go.”
The 4x200 relay team trailed Uniondale for most of the race before passing them late. Appolon was supposed to compete for the Bruins, but an injured calf suffered during the hurdles forced Higgins to replace him with Williams.
“We were pretty confident that if we got to stick around, that we had a good shot of beating the other teams to the second spot,” Higgins said.
Baldwin’s 47 points at the counties was the same as last year and good for third in the competition. Turner was third in the 300-meter dash and helped win a county championship in the 4x200 relay with Prawl, Appolon, and senior Christon Raysor.
The 4x400 relay team of Williams, junior Hayden Castello, senior Jeremy Rosario, and sophomore C.J. Graham finished third and Thweatt was third in the 55-meter dash. Junior Chinonso Ajomiwe’s leap of 40 feet, 3.75 inches was good for sixth in the triple jump.
