Northside junior Tamia Knauls has already experienced the thrill of victory this year.

She was a member of the Lady Bears’ 6A state championship basketball team in March.

On Thursday, Knauls had just as big a day on the track competing at the McDonald’s Relays at Jim Rowland Stadium. She finished with three gold medals, two in individual events and the other as part of Northside’s 400-meter relay team, which set a personal best time.

“I don’t know, I’ve just put in the time and it paid off,” Knauls said.

“I like it here, this is home. I’ve been doing this since elementary (school), so I like this.”

Knauls won the long jump with a measurement of 15-8 1/2 and also won the 100-meter dash in a time of 12.99 in helping Northside finish in third place in the team standings.

Because Knauls had a late start to doing track since she was coming off basketball, it took her quite a while to get into shape.

“This is her third meet, I think, since she came out, and she did real well in the long jump last week, had a pretty good outing, and did real well in the 100,” Northside girls coach Jeff Lewis said. “She’s just a talent, and who knows where she would be if she had another month of shape under her. ... But she’s coming on pretty fast, so hopefully, she’ll come around before we get to the state meet.”

Knauls also was the final leg in the 400-meter relay team, which set a personal best with a time of 51.27. The other members of the team were Deairah Mays, J’Leace Horton and Sierre Thompson.


“I felt like the chemistry between our hand-offs was really good this time because before, we had people that hadn’t ran it before and they did really good but our team now has experience in doing the four-by-one for the past three years,” Thompson, a senior, said. “I feel like we have a good bond and chemistry together when we run.”

Even a bout with shin splints wasn’t going to stop Thompson from helping her relay team come in first place.

“Our first meet, our time was over 53 seconds and slowly but surely, we’ve gotten it down but (Thursday) was our best because we cut it down two seconds to 51.27,” Thompson said.

Northside’s girls 3,200-meter relay team of Felicity West, Cynthia Flores, Andrea Garcia and Darriana Franklin also came in first, finishing with a time of 10:49.44.

Lewis said Franklin had to step in as the final leg because he had several runners missing Thursday’s event because they are in Northside’s Junior ROTC program, and the unit had their official chain of command for the new officers come in.


