Boys take first, girls second by only four points
It’s been a while since this editor has covered any sports related to St. Clair/Loyola way. But I was once again reminded how well the Crusaders cross country program is run on Tuesday, September 17.
The boys and girls traveled to Riverview Golf Course outside of New Richland to take on eight other squads in one of the more challenging 5k meter courses of the season. The runners started at the driving range and walked around the slightly hilly parts of the course before trekking up one large hill about 75 feet high. They did another lap with a similar path before taking one last loop around the course. The end features the steepest hill of them all. If this editor had to guess, it was well over a hundred feet.
It was little to no problem for Loyola, as the boys stormed to a first-place finish with 24 points, beating second-place Pacelli by 33 points. Tri-City United took third with 78, Randolph fourth with 111, WEM-JWP fifth with 133, and Medford in sixth with 142. Although the girls were just short of first place by four points, they still had a commendable second-place finish as a team with 37 points, beating TCU’s 75, WEM-JWP’s 94, Randolph’s 119, and Medford’s 163; Pacelli took first with 33 points.
The Crusader boys Soren Kelly and Sam Vetter took the top two spots of the race out of 60 runners, with Kelly clocking in at 16:45 and Vetter at 17:25. TJ Waldron and Mitchell Buboltz collected two more top ten finishes for the team, both taking 6th (18:11.6) and 8th (18:20.7) respectively. Two more Crusader boys collected top twenty spots, with Chase Kijenski taking 14th (19:55.9) and Rollie Matejcek behind him in 16th (19:59.8).
Other finishers for the boys were George Crimmins (29th, 21:52), Andrew Tieva (30th, 22:26.7), Grayson Fenske-Deichman (39th, 23:09.7), Jackson Bilitz (42nd, 23:34.1), and Jax Leagjeid (49th, 25:08.3).
Although short of first place as a team, all of the Loyola girls’ varsity runners placed in the top 25. Charlotte Meyer took first overall with an 18:43.7 time. St. Clair’s own Valerie Quast took fifth with a 21:38.6. The other top twenty runners were Molly Koester (11th, 23:08.9), Izzy Endres (12th, 23:23.6), and Kate Daly (15th, 23:46.4). Teya Waagner took 22nd with 24:37.5, and Charlotte Kirschner took 24th with 24:48.9.
The junior high runners did great. The boys took three of the top five spots (Francis Bierer took first place) and earned first as a team with 24 points. The girls’ junior high team also took three of five spots, with Riley Quigley and Brooks Waagner taking the top two spots.
The Loyola-Cleveland-St. Clair cross country teams hosted a meet at Cleveland on Tuesday, September 24. The results will be in next week’s paper.
