Eastern's girls and Western's boys cross country teams claimed top honors in Saturdays Howard County meet at Northwestern in a tune up for Tuesday's Mid Indiana Conference championships at Western. In the girls meet, the No. 6-ranked Comets took five of the top 10 spots to win despite not having the services of No. 2 runner Brittany Neeley. Eastern finished with 25 points, ahead of second-place Northwestern (36) and third-place Western (70). Taylor ran incomplete.

Eastern's Sarah Wagner set the pace in the girls' race, winning in a time of 20:27.

Bethany Neeley finished right on her heels to take second with an identical time. Avery Ewing finished third one second later, while Breann Donson (ninth, 23:34) and Elyssa DeAngulo (10th, 23:44) added top-10 finishes for the Comets.

"We tried to back off a little bit saving for the MIC," Eastern coach Brandon Mink said. "We wanted [Bethany Neeley, Wagner and Ewing] to go out and control the pace of the race, and they made a little breakaway from the Northwestern girls midway through the race and held that lead. Breann and Elyssa ran really well. It's the first time they've run fourth and fifth for us this season and they did an awesome job. The main thing was that they really moved up well through the race. They were behind several Northwestern runners, and once they got past the first mile they started picking them off."

Taryn Thor led the runner-up Tigers - who put four in the top eight - with a fourth-place finish in 20:49. Kinds Gingerich finished sixth in 22:10, Heidi Freeman was close behind in seventh in 22:30, Karly Sprouse followed in eighth in 23:32, and Rachel Johns look I I th in 23:56.

"The girls ran pretty well," Northwestern coach Dave Stevens said. "We knew it would be a challenge to beat Eastern, but we're pleased with how we did. We have a couple kids who are under the weather but still ran hard. We're looking forward to seeing how we do at the MIC [meet] Tuesday." Nichole Hampshire led Western with a fifth-place finish in 22:04. She was followed by Taylor Nunan in 14th (25:33), Cecile Peleriaux in 18th (26:15), Olivia Nixon in 19th (26:19) and Brooke Schroeder in 20th (27:17) and Faith Mooney (27th, 29:44).

Ashley Nguyen (28th. 29:51) and Alana Hendrickson (29th. 34:57) rounded out Taylor's lineup.

BOYS RACE

In the boys race, Western's top five all finished in the top eight overall to help give the Panthers their 11th straight county fide with 26 points. Eastern was second with 53, edging Northwestern by one point while Taylor ran incomplete.

"That speaks to our consistency," Western coach Gary Jewell said. "We're the only program [in the county] that has had a complete team each year in that stretch. I told the guys coming in that they were in the driver's seat, and they recognize that but we wanted to really try and avoid a letdown. This sets us up our next couple meets, the MIC and then the sectional, with the conference meet giving us a good leadup up into the postseason. If we want to do well in those, we need to focus on the task at hand. I thought we did a pretty good job of that [Saturday]."

Matt Grider (17:13) and Jacob Bradshaw (17:24) finished second and third overall to lead the Panthers, while Riley Worl (18:19), Austin Elliott (18:44) and Caleb Maddox (18:47) went 6-7-8 to add to Western's strong showing.

Eastern's Lewis Duke was the race winner in 16:58. Adam Schaff followed in fourth in 17:30, while Sam Higdon (14th, 19:19), Kevin Zheng (20th, 19:56) and Matt Kerner (34th, 24:51) helped the Comets take second place.

"We were a bit surprised we beat Northwestern by one," Mink said. "It was nice to have five runners after being shy with some setbacks with injuries this year. It was a good day for us, Lewis was awesome and strong throughout. With the MIC [Tuesday] we will see times drop across the board."

Zach Duranto turned in a fifth-place showing in 18:05 to lead Northwestern. Charlie Neher (ninth, 18:48) added a top-10 finish, followed by Shad lakes (11th, 18:57), Bradley Jakes (15th, 19:24) and Taylor McLain (1935).

"We had one of our top three home sick [Saturday]," Stevens said. "We were that close with the other schools but dropped to third. Our guys ran well. Duranto put up a great time for this course, and several other runners had course bests. Overall I'm pleased with what we did. One of our bigger goals is the conference meet, so we're looking forward to Tuesday." Taylor's Nick Denman finished 35th in 18:55.