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After track practice on Wednesday, Lely coaches Nick Young and Mike McGarity sat down and talked about today’s Class 3A state meet.

“We probably have a combined 60 years at Lely,” Young said. “And neither of us could remember a time before when we’d had a girls track champion at the regional meet.”

This year, that girl was Manolitha Joseph, who won the 200-meter run at last week’s regional. Joseph will lead four qualifiers from the Lely girls team at today’s state meet at Winter Park High School’s Showalter Field.

Young said all four Lely girls qualifiers should have a chance to finish high in their events.

Joseph is seeded second in the 200 and 10th — by four-tenths of a second — in the 100. Fellow senior Lindsey Bott is tied for third in the pole vault, junior Victoria Howard ranks 13th in long jump, and junior Amber Imm ranks 15th in the 1,600 and fourth in the 3,200.

Today’s meet will be the conclusion of a decorated but sometimes frustrating athletic career for Joseph at Lely. Young said Joseph has been hurt at key times in the past, and rather than pushing her too hard, this year the focus has been to keep her healthy for state.

“In the past I saw her ability and talent and sometimes I pushed her too hard,” Young said. “This year, I told her we’re not going to do that. We want to keep her healthy. (Joseph) is one of the most athletic girls to ever come through Lely.’’

NAPLES GIRLS: Despite fewer individual high finishes, the Naples girls team finished ahead of Lely at last week’s region meet.

And the Golden Eagles qualified five athletes for today’s state meet. Four of those girls are part of Naples’ second-seeded 4x800-meter relay. Hannah Lewis, Oona Watkins, Glenn Watkins and Kinsley McEachern have run the event together all season, coach Mary Beth Watkins said.

“It’s a given that they’re all going to give their best race (at the state meet),” Mary Beth Watkins said.

For Lewis, a senior, today’s meet and relay could mean redemption. She ran the 4x800 all last season but missed the state meet because of an illness. That group ended up breaking the school record, something Lewis hopes to help her team do again today.

Whether Naples’ relay team breaks a record will have a lot to do with the performance of its anchor runner, McEachern, who has a busy day planned. In addition to the 4x800, she’s ranked sixth in the 3,200 and 10th in the 1,600.

“Her progress this year has been amazing,” Watkins said of McEachern. “She dropped from 11 minutes and 52 seconds last year to 11:28 this year in the two-mile. You rarely see that kind of drop when you get to that fast of times.”

But the distance runners aren’t the only Golden Eagles girls headed to state. Quin Scott could make a big impact in the field events. She ranks fourth in the shot put and second in the discus.

OTHER AREA GIRLS: Barron Collier basketball standout Erin Zampell ranks third in the shot put, and Janevia Hall of Palmetto Ridge ranks third in the 100 hurdles.