Nansemond-Suffolk Academy junior Jared Morse won the Tidewater Conference of Independent Schools championship for the 100-meter dash at Christopher Newport University on Tuesday with a time of 11.73 seconds, claiming the Saints’ first win in the event in more than a decade.

“It’s a great accomplishment,” Morse said. “I worked hard, and I never really thought of having that goal in my mind until the second meet of the season, when I won at Bishop Sullivan (Catholic High School), and I told myself, ‘I might be able to win the TCIS.’ And I just kept working hard, and it was a dream of mine this whole season. I was able to get it done.”

He won the preliminary heat about 25 minutes beforehand with a time of 11.54 seconds and a second-place finisher close behind. This proved to be in strong contrast to the final.

“I actually won pretty convincingly, which was surprising to me,” Morse said. “I thought it was going to be real close, but I pulled away with the last 20 meters, and there was no one really within a couple strides of me.”

“Ironically, the finals time was my slowest time all season,” he said. “My fastest time was 10.94 when I ran at Greenbrier Christian (Academy).”

NSA boys’ track coach Terry Crigger said there was a crosswind, which may have played a role in everyone’s time being down. But while Morse has shown improvement getting out of the blocks, Crigger said a sub-par start accounted for his slower finals time.

“I talked with him about that, and worked on that (Friday) at practice and we’ll continue to work that all next week until we get to the state meet on Saturday,” he said.

Morse, whose primary sport is football, came into this season with somewhat limited track experience.

“I ran track my freshman year,” he said. “Sophomore year, I ran for a little bit, and things didn’t work out, so I came back for my junior year and really thrived and was able to be successful, because I had never won any events, up until this year.”

“I think that he’s finally just realized that he can do this,” Crigger said. “His work ethic has been second-to-none this year. He’s really worked hard at it.”

According to Milestat.com, Morse’s best time this season of 10.94 seconds is currently No. 1 in the state among private schools in the Virginia Independent Schools Athletic Association.

Morse also qualified for the state meet with the 4×100-meter relay team.

Overall for the TCIS meet, the Nansemond-Suffolk boys’ team finished fifth out of 10 teams with 39 points, and the girls’ team finished tied for seventh out of 10 teams with nine points.

The state meet will take place Saturday at Virginia Commonwealth University.