Carmel swept the girls and boys championships in the Western Cross Country Invitational Saturday at Oakbrook Valley.
The Greyhound teams are ranked No, 2 in their respective polls. The invitational also featured the No. 9-ranked West Lafayette girls team.
"Our goal is to make this invitational one of the best in Indiana, and certainly to have Carmel come in this year and to have several new teams commit for next year is a step toward that goal," Western coach Dana Neer said.
"As an example of the increased competition [former Western standout Annina Gruber was the girls runner-up in 2005 when she ran 16:32. Jenn Elliott ran two seconds faster this year, 16:30, and placed 10th. It's good for us. We want to run against the best competition."
In the girls race, Carmel runners took five of the top eight spots for an impressive team score of 22. West Lafayette (63) took second in the 12-team field. Western (116) claimed third and was followed by Oak Hill (167), Eastbrook (169), Kokomo (178), Maconaquah (182), Northwestern (189), Peru (207), Tipton (258), Rochester (259) and Cass (281).
Carmel's Kayla McCurdy blistered the course in 15:10 to take individual honors. Kokomo's Adrienne Shepherd led all local runners as she toured the course in 16:22 to finish in seventh place.
Also for the Kats, Nicky Parry took , 17th place in a time of 16:55. Elliott and Katie Hollingsworth (16:36) finshed 10th and llth, respectively, to lead Western. Lacey Myer also had a solid run for the Panthers as she covered the course in 17:22 to finish 25th.
"Jenn Elliott had a great finish, and I think she was happy with her time. The previous two times she raced on this course, I think she walked away with a discontent in her spirit. She ran a nice [personal best Saturday]," Neer said. "Another true success story is Katie Hollingsworth." She cut a minute and a half off her time from 2005 and placed a very strong llth. Lacey Meyer had a great week of practice and is back strong and fast."
Neer also noted the performanc~ es of his other runners as well.
"We had the exact same total team time as last year to the second, and we were sixth in semistate last year, so this young group of girls is doing very well Neer said.
Jessica Parkman led Peru with a time of 16:42, which was good for 13th place. Erica Stackhouse (16:50, 16th place) led the Tipton contingent; Kolena Bowman (17:02, 18th place) led Maconaquah; and Jennifer Claudio (17:13, 21st Place) had the top showing for Northwestern.
In the boys race, Carmel Put three runners in the top five on its way to a winning team score of 32, Kokomo (68) took second in the 12,team field and Peru (103), West Lafayette (!04), Western (162) and Oak Hill (162) rounded out the top six.
Western, on the strength of its fifth runner's time, won the tiebreaker for fifth place. Rochester (198), Tipton (200), Northwestern (219), Eastbrook, (230), Maconaquah (295) and Cass (320) rounded out the standings.
Carmel's J.D. Smith (16:27)and Peru's Cody Siblisk (16:54) finished , 1-2. Kokomo's Ryan Perry (16:51) took fourth and the Northwestern duo of Matt Ullmer (17x08} and Kory Kennedy (17:25) finihsed sixth and ninth respectively.
Tipton's Brady Butler (17:45) and Western's Luke Minor (17:50) finished 14th and 15th and were followed by a trio of Kokomo runners - Mason McGovern (1753), Cameron Cunningham (17:54) and Brandon Sheline (17:54).
"This is a course of strength and with the technical aspects and the hills, older boys do better. In fact, 22 of the top 50 runners were upperclassmen", Neer noted. "We just have one senior in our top seven lineup, Luke Minor, and he did a good job and had a top-15 finish. Zac Martinez was able to race his first race this year and ran a solid 18:00 [to finish 20th]. It was a great debut for him"