Short-handed lady harriers take second
The Ronan Invitational Cross Country meet turned into a highly competitive event with the addition of traditional Class AA cross-country powers Flathead and Missoula Hellgate. The Lady Bulldogs placed second behind the Hellgate team, 32 to 46. They finished ahead of Flathead, which placed third with 71 points.
"We went in a bit short-handed without Stella Holt," Whitefish coach Bill Brist said. "Missoula Hellgate has a great team, and they took advantage of the opportunity. They were the better team on that day, given the situation. I was really pleased with how all of our girls ran, however."
Coaches decided to rest Stella since she has had some lower leg soreness. At this time of the season, the team wants to be safe with even minor injuries. She'll be back in action today at Thompson Falls.
Carly Schwickert led the Bulldogs with her personal best performance of 19:29. That was good for fourth place in the meet. She was followed closely by teammates Bailey Eaton (19:34) and Jessica Sagen (19:52). Jackie Cassidy had a season best time of 20:02 to finish in ninth place.
"This was the first time that Carly has managed to get by her teammates Bailey and Jess," Brist said. "I was very impressed with our young ladies' performances."
Torrey Coe, Anne Gustenhoff and Maya Gordon all posted personal-best times with their performance as part of the team's top-seven.
"We're excited about the development of our younger runners," Brist said. "Torrey and Maya are both just freshman and they're really improving with each opportunity. It's neat to see the excitement from all of our younger runners."
The Boys team had a great day, as well. Whitefish ended up in fourth place out of the eleven teams that participated. They finished one point behind defending class A State Champion Columbia Falls 92 to 93. Flathead edged Hellgate for the team title.
Nathan Knox, Mathias Komarek, Fischer Gangemi, Jace Kalbfleisch finished 15th, 16th, 18th and 19th. The split between the four was an amazingly close 15 seconds. Will Holdhusen placed 25th.
"The top-five boys are running very well right now," Brist said. "As we continue with our workouts, I can see more improvement during the second part of the season. If we can keep our third and fourth runners as close to our top two runners as we did in this meet, we'll be competitive in just about every meet. If we can get our number 5-6-7 runners to make that move to close the gap, then we will be in a great place. It's possible, with this team."
The efforts of the younger runners was also noted as a plus with the boys team.
"We had seven other boys run under 20 minutes for the 3-mile distance," Brist said. "These seven are all freshman and sophomore runners. That gives me an indication that there's a bright future for this boys team."
The boys and girls teams will travel to Thompson Falls on Thursday for their next competition.