Eastern, Kokomo and Western competed Saturday in the Culver s Academies cross country meet which ' featured open (big schools) and / closed (smaller schools) divisions.

On the girls side, Eastern stepped up to compete in the open division.

The Comets finished 12th in a field of 33 complete teams.

"We wanted to test ourselves once again against some of the best runners in the state and we did very well team wise," Eastern coach Brandon Mink said. "This was probably our best team performance, on paper any way. It's the first time our top five has averaged under 20 minutes. We did edge a few ranked teams in the state so that was a nice thing to see."

Bethany Neeley led the Comets with a 15th-place finish. She covered the course in 19:01. Eastern's top five also included Brittany Neeley (32nd, 19:25); Sarah Wagner (53rd, 19:52); Avery Ewing (78th, 20:11) and Ari Rinaldo (144th, 21:07).

"We had four of our six girls run personal bests," Mink noted. "I was pleased with the way Bethany hung in there as well. She was 15th overall. With a mile left she was as high as 23rd and her leges were tired. She really fought back to get in the top 15.

"It was a good day overall. We were looking to see how we'll stack up oin our semistate and there was only one team from our semistate that ran faster than us."

Competing in the closed division, Western didn't field enough varsity runners for a full team. Cara Love was 69th to lead Western in 21:53, Nicole Hampshire was 94th (22:39), and Katie Singer was 176th (25:29).

"Again we didn't field a full team," Westerncoach Joni McCracken said noting injureis and illness continue to hamper the squad. "They just seem to learngin race by race how to trust themselves and their training. We had three girls run [personal records] today. Also, Cara Love and Nicole Hampshire are doing a great job of stepping into that leadership role that they've not been used to playing in the past. Nicole's a freshman and she's doing a great job of being that second runner right now."

Boys race

In the open division, Kokomo placed 35th out of 37 teams. The Kats ran without No. 1 runner Jeremy Breedlove, who is lost for the balance of the season with a fractured metatarsal.

The Kats' top five runners were Matt Scharenbroch (217th place, 18:28), Waylon Coulter (219th, 18:32), Brent Noll (220th, 18:33), Jordan Fivecoate (232nd, 19: 25) and Josh Revils (248th, 23:42).

In the closed division, Western was 11th and Eastern was 25th in a field of 27 complete teams.

Western's top five runners were: Matt Grider (ninth place, 16:51); Jacob Bradshaw (35th, 17:38); Braxton Bagwell (73rd, 18:04); Austin Elliott (77th, 18:08) and Auston Davenport (118th, 18:40).

"I wish that my varsity had got to run under the same conditions as the guys who ran the freshman-sophomore race because in the middle of the [freshman] race, it began to pour down rain and the course changed completely. It went from being pretty fast to being very muddy," Western coach Gary Jewell said, noting his varsity still ran pretty well.

Eastern's top five runners were: Adam Schaaf (32nd place, 17:35). Lewis Duke (43rd, 17:41), Damon Byers (213th, 21:28), Kevin Zheng (220th, 21:42) and Jason Taylor (247th, 23:58).

"I thought overall we did decently," Mink said. "We had Adam and Lewis out front and they did pretty well. They fell a little bit further behind than we wanted early and they had a lot of ground to make up. They passed tons of runners in the second half. I think we could have done a little better if we had started better with that big of a crowd.

"Lewis got a personal best as well as Jason, so overall it was a pretty decent day."