Lawrence High's Chebon Dawes competes in the shot put. Dawes finished third in the event Wednesday at LHS.

A rivalry between teammates can be healthy for competition. But the best really comes out when a friendly wager is made.

At least that’s how it is for Lawrence High track and field throwers Chebon Dawes and Quintin Rucker in the shot put.

“Chebon beat me the other day in Manhattan, and we had a bet going that he’d never beat me this year,” said Rucker following LHS’ home meet on Wednesday. “Then today I called double-or-nothing, and I beat him in the shot.”

Rucker tied his best throw in the shot put with a first-place toss of 47 feet, 11 inches, while Dawes reached 45 feet, 7 inches, to finish third.

The pair flipped finishes in the discus, with Dawes coming out on top with a throw of 147 feet. Rucker finished third but topped his previous high in the discus with a toss of 134 feet, 7 inches.

The top placings by Rucker and Dawes still weren’t enough for the LHS boys, who finished third in the three-team event with 39 points – behind Blue Valley West (97 points) and Topeka West (50).

Rucker’s improvement on discus has him raring to overtake Dawes in a second event.

“I feel like I’m coming up on Chebon,” Rucker said. “If he falls asleep for a second, he better watch out, because I may be in front of him.”

Dawes laughed at Rucker’s remark and offered his teammate some advice.

“Personally, I don’t know about discus for him. He’s still got some muscle to get up on to,” Dawes said. “He needs to work a little bit harder on the discus part, because I’ve already got that one down. He could probably try, but I don’t know if he’ll be able to do anything on it.”

Will Pendleton scored a large part of the boys’ total with first-place finishes in the triple jump (38 feet, 10 inches) along with the pole vault (11 feet).

Lawrence’s girls team also came in third, but its 29 points were just seven behind Topeka West for second place.

LHS claimed first and second in the high jump. Tania Jackson and Louisa Hussein finished first and second, respectively, both clearing the five-foot mark.

The girls swept the top three positions in the javelin with Bridget Wenger’s 99-foot toss leading the way. Kylie Waite (96 feet, 11 inches) finished second, and Camila Sanders took third with a throw of 95 feet, 5 inches.