Lizzie Keen (foreground) maintains her lead in the GISA AA state track meet. Briarwood Academy eighth grader Lizzie Keen captured the only state championship title for Briarwood Academy at the GISA AA state track meet held at Hugh Mills Stadium in Albany.

"It's a pretty amazing accomplishment for an eighth grader to win a state championship," Coach Clayton Parrish said. "She saved her best race for the last and did a really good job."

Lizzie is the daughter of John and Rhonda Keen of Washington and won the 400-meter dash for the Lady Bucs with a time of 63.45 seconds.

Another Washington eighth grader, Anna Goolsby, daughter of

Barry and Cindy Goolsby of Washington, placed third in the 800-meter run with a time of 2:33. She placed fifth in the 400-meter dash.

"They're pretty solid for a couple of eighth graders," Coach Parrish said. "Anna ran well all year. Her only loss for this year (until the state meet) was against the state champion and state record holder, actually," Parrish said.

Both girls also ran on the Lady Bucs' relay teams, both of which placed sixth. Lizzie ran on the 4x100 meter relay team while both Lizzie and Anna ran on the 4x400 meter relay team. Anna ran on the Lady Bucs #2 4x100 meter relay team which placed eighth.

Briarwood junior Olivia Lyons, daughter of Cynthia and Mark Walker of Washington, placed sixth in the high jump.

The Lady Bucs placed fifth overall in the state meet, capturing one first place, three third places, three fourth places, two fifth places, and three sixth places.

All 10 of the Lady Bucs who qualified for the state meet in running events in the Region 1AA meet qualified for state competition in the qualification trials held Friday morning. As qualification trials are not held for the field events, all region qualifiers participated in the field events.