It started as an inside joke for Batavia’s 4 x 400-meter relay.

“We started a little joke at the beginning of the season,” Batavia senior J.R. Kabba said. “I told the guys to give me somebody to chase.”

After the Bulldogs’ performance at Saturday’s state finals, nobody but the Bulldogs was laughing.

Taking the baton from Erich Zeddies with the Bulldogs sitting in eighth place, Kabba proceeded to pass two runners on the backstretch and four more on the home stretch to propel Batavia to a second-place time of 3:18.9, less than a second back from Neuqua Valley.

“He’s something else,” Zeddies said. “He’s just unreal.”

As the Class 3A 4 x 400 relays milled around the infield following the final race of the weekend, one runner from Belleville West approached Kabba and was heard to say, “You’ve got the nastiest kick.”

With most of the runners hugging the rail in the first lane while coming down the homestretch, Kabba swung out to lane three while rocketing the Bulldogs up to second.

The makers of Super Mario Brothers can indirectly share in Batavia’s amazing finish.

“It sounds goofy but when I’m chasing guys, what’s going through my head is the Bowser theme song from Super Mario Brothers,” Kabba said. “It keeps me relaxed so I don’t panic.”

Batavia floated near the back of the pack for much of the race but not for lack of effort. Lead leg Andrew Thomas and second leg Drew Dienslake were visibly exhausted after their laps and Zeddies left nothing to chance on his lap.

“I go all out every race,” he said. “When I gave it to J.R. I didn’t think he’d be able to recover like that.”

“My teammates kept us in it,” Kabba said. “All four of us went all out. All the guys on our relay ran personal-record splits this weekend. When you do that, that’s what gets you second in the state.”

Kabba’s unprecedented relay kick came not long after he passed three other runners on the home stretch to take the state title in the open 400 with a time of 47.49. He defeated Homewood-Flossmoor’s Eric Oliver at the line for the title.

“I broke my PR in the 400,” Kabba said. “To do that at a state meet with teams like York and East St. Louis, to beat some of those guys, that’s all you can ask for.”

Kabba earned a state medal in the 100 dash with an eighth place time of 10.96, which was faster than his ninth-seeded time in the prelims (11.01).

The 4 x 100 relay of junior Dan Skinner, sophomores David Voland and Emund Kabba and junior Scott Poulos finished eighth in their prelim heat with a time of 43.65.

Rob Mohr clocked a 15.18 in the prelims of the 110 hurdles and finished seventh in his heat.

Bulldogs’ all-state finishes
NAME        EVENT    PLACE    MARK
J.R. Kabba    400         1st        47.49

Relay         4 x 400      2nd      3:18.90

J.R. Kabba    100         8th        10.96