Cross country teams both take second at Western A Classic

The Columbia Falls cross country teams both took second at the Western A Fall Classic in Stevensville Saturday — the last race before the state A final this week at Rebecca Farm in Kalispell.

The boys were edged by Browning by nine points, while the girls were 40 points behind Corvallis.

Oliver Kress led the boys with an 11th-place finish, clocking a 16:55.71. Logan Peterson was 12th, River Blazejewski was 13th and Lucas Peterson was 14th as the Cats came across the line in a pack, and all under 17 minutes for the first time this season, save for Lucas, who was 2 seconds over 17.

Quinn Clark took 20th to round out the scoring for the Cats.

Taylor Doleac of Hamilton won the race.

On the girls’ side, Ally Sempf led the Wildcats with a ninth place finish, clocking a 20:38, teammate Mya Badger was 10th, Marissa Schaeffer was 12th, Cora Hannan was 21st and Chloe Savoy was 32nd.

The girls were without Ashley Andrews, one of their top runners. The hope is she’ll be back by this Saturday, coach Jim Peacock said.

This Saturday the boys are scheduled to race at 12:50 p.m., while girls are scheduled to race at 1:40 p.m. All classes will compete at the same course.

Peacock was pleased with the boys’ effort and noted that Browning has one of the most successful programs in state A history.

“We are right there with (Browning’s) current boys’ team, and I look forward to seeing how things go this weekend,” he said. “Our boys packed up amazingly well.  We had three kids go sub-17, which is awesome … having a 34 second split between our first through fifth runners is absolutely fantastic.  That’s the equivalent of having a super balanced scoring threat in basketball where all your starters score 10-12 points per game.  That’s hard to defend in basketball, and in cross country, the tight split means you’re hard to match up with.”

Peacock had kudos for the girls, too.

“They were outstanding as well. Corvallis beat us, but we match up with them well.  Without Ashley on Saturday, our score is a little higher, but we still competed extremely well.  That’s a good indication of having a little depth with Chloe Savoy running so well.  She had another personal best time.  She’s getting faster and learning more about racing every week.  If we have our A game on Saturday, we’re in the hunt,” he said.

The JV teams raced well, too — a sign of a solid program.“Our boys put five runners in the top 10 and dominated that race.  Our girls took second overall.  That depth might mean good things in upcoming years too,” Peacock said.