New Haven — It was after its triumph in the Eastern Connecticut Conference Division I championship meet last week that East Lyme coach Steve Hargis told his team he felt the Vikings could deliver a title at the state level, as well.

“After ECCs, I was sold this was a championship-level team,” Hargis said Saturday. “At that meet, they executed what we wanted them to execute and more. I told them, ‘I don’t throw compliments around too often.’ I said, ‘This is a pretty special event.’”

On a day the ECC had a pretty special day in general at the Class M state indoor track championship at the Floyd Little Athletic Center, East Lyme had the best day of all, winning the boys’ team title with 54.33 points.

Tolland finished second with 49 in a meet which came down to the final painstaking event, the long jump, and Bethel was third with 46.

Hillhouse won the girls’ title with 82 points and Bethel was second with 35. New London was fourth (28 points), Ledyard sixth (24) and Waterford eighth (23).

Waterford sophomore Avery Maiese, the ECC girls’ cross country champion in the fall, won two individual Class M titles. She took the 1,000 meters in 3 minutes, 8.50 seconds, leaping with joy as she crossed the finish line in a personal best.

Maiese also won the 1,600 in 5:26.03, coming from behind to force a photo finish. Maiese was originally listed second on the website which displays the meet’s results, only finding out after a few moments had passed that she actually won.

New London sophomore Darielys Arnold won the girls’ long jump in her first season competing in the event, covering 17 feet, 11.5 inches, more than a foot farther than the runner-up.

Also, Ledyard claimed a pair of titles, with Jacob Lenz winning the boys’ long jump at 22-0 and the girls’ formidable 4x800 team of Josephine Withbroe, Samantha Doran, Ella Stephenson and Kate Littler repeating the Colonels’ championship from a year ago in 10:10.62.

As for East Lyme, it finished the day on the track with a second-place finish by sophomore Sean McCauley in the 3,200 in 9:43.85 and a second-place finish by the 4x400 team of Shawn Henning, Lucas DeNucci, Kai Ritz and Brendan Fant in 3:36.08, giving the Vikings the winning margin.

Hargis was convinced the final advantage might come from the 2.33 points Henning earned by finishing in a tie for fourth in the pole vault (11-6).

“They’re a great group of young men,” Hargis said. “We have a great mix of ages, experience levels. They really just feed off each other.”

“We did everything we could today,” said Fant, an East Lyme senior. “We got out here, we competed, everyone ran well. Everyone knew the mission going into it. We had a shot to do it, but there were a lot of teams in it, a lot of teams have been going back and forth on the leader board. ... Really, everyone on the team contributed.”

The Vikings also got a second-place finish from Fant in the 1,000 (2:37.30) and a second from Thomas Matlock in the shot put (52-7.25). The sprint medley relay team of Henning, DeNucci, Finian Gates and Fant added a runner-up finish in 3:41.38.

It was a different lineup for the Vikings than they used at the ECC meet. Hargis credited assistant coach Mike Flynn, the boys’ and girls’ head cross country coach, with designing the game plan for Saturday.

“He was the architect of the points, he took it on,” Hargis said. “He’s not an assistant coach, he’s another head coach. ... We talked over the phone and I asked him some questions and next time we practiced, I asked him some more questions and then he sold me.”

New London’s Arnold, who also finished second in the high jump (5-0) and fourth in the 55 meters (7.38), tried the jumps for the first time at the behest of head coach Natalie Bowens, the former Montville and Southern Connecticut State University track standout.

“My first time really doing it was during a meet and I got 18-2, which was like my second jump,” Arnold said. “Then we went to practice and practiced it a little bit. (Bowens) taught me some things and now I’m here.”

Bowens, the State Open triple jump champ as a senior at Montville in 2013, said her career best in the long jump was 17-9.

“One practice before a meet we just threw her in (the long jump) and she looked OK,” Bowens said. “I’m not gonna lie, I was like, ‘Let’s see what she does. This might be a one-and-done type thing.’ Then we got to the meet; her first jump, she jumped 18 feet. And we were like, ‘Oh, OK, you’re a long jumper.’”

Maiese has come behind before at the finish line, winning the ECC outdoor 3,200 last spring in the same fashion.

“I know I have nothing left to lose because it’s the last, like, 100 meters and a girl was coming up behind me and putting me into fourth,” Maiese said of her comeback in the 1,600. “So I started sprinting and I just kept going.”

Other top local girls’ finishers were Ledyard’s Littler (3rd, 600), New London’s Kmara Royster (third, high jump), East Lyme’s Sandra Kirvelevicius (3rd, shot put), Ledyard’s Stephenson (5th, 600), East Lyme’s Grace Blackwood (5th, high jump), East Lyme’s Aranza Torres (5th, 1,000), East Lyme’s Lacey-Lee Keramidas (5th, pole vault), Waterford’s Elle Dibuono (6th, long jump) and East Lyme’s Kennedy Holsapple (6th, 1,600).

Ledyard was third in the girls’ 4x400, Waterford fifth in the 4x200 and East Lyme fifth in the sprint medley relay.

Other top local boys’ finishers were Ledyard’s Mateo Viviano (3rd, pole vault), Waterford’s Elliot Childs (4th, 55 hurdles), East Lyme’s Ritz (4th, 600), East Lyme’s DeNucci (5th, 600), East Lyme’s Nate Bergman (5th, 1,600) and Ledyard’s Roan Fothergill (5th, 300).

Ledyard’s boys were second in the 4x800 and sixth in the 4x200 and East Lyme was fourth in the 4x800.

v.fulkerson@theday.com