Eastern girls XC squad earns repeat regional championship

Kokomo Tribune - October 14, 2012

CULVER - When Eastern's girls cross country team won its first regional title a season ago, excitement and jubilation ruled the day as the Comets took the top step on the podium for the first time.

This time around, the thrill of victory was still present, but most of the excitement within the squad has been replaced by expectations.

The expectations were met, at least for the time being, in Saturdays Culver Academies Regional, as the No. 6-ranked Comets placed five runners in the top 10 to repeat as regional champions with 28 points. No. 15 Warsaw was the runner-up with 42.

"Repeating as the regional champion is a big step for our program," Eastern coach Brandon Mink said. "We have to be very proud of that. I'm pretty proud of the kids. They've been working pretty hard. I expect that we will continue to get better as we move on. We're looking at our own individual things at this point and asking, "Did we do what we needed to do?' We did what we needed to do to win [Saturday], but we need to step up even higher next week [at semistate]. It's going to be much more competitive from here on out.”

Warsaw's Ashley Erba, the defending cross country state champion, set a torrid pace throughout the girls race. She blistered the blustery course on the shore of Lake Maxinkuckee, winning in a state-record time of 17:12.5.

Eastern's Bethany Neeley finished a distant second place in 18:37.3 after staying in Erba's hip pocket for the first eight minutes of the race.

"Honestly, I wasn't pleased at all," Neeley said. "The time was OK — probably my fastest time compared to last year. But, compared to what my training has been like, it wasn't a good race. I was supposed to go out with [Erba] and the wind became a factor. Once I got out there by myself it wasn't good. It wasn't a terrible race, but there are things I can improve on."

Sister Brittany Neeley took fourth in 19:18.8, while freshman Carly Jones finished fifth in 19:30.0 for the Comets, the only freshman finisher in the top seven.

"We really need to work as a team" Brittany said. "We've raced against ourselves in the past three weeks, so [Saturday] we were a little rusty and didn't work as a team as well as we should have. We really need to work on that in the next two weeks, because that is what will carry us the farthest."

Sarah Wagner followed in seventh at 19:51.9, and Avery Ewing's 10th-place finish in 20:17.9 rounded out Eastern's championship performance, which didn't escape critiques from Mink.some excellent teams next week in the [New Prairie] semistate," Mink said. "West Lafayette will be there, the second-ranked team in the state. We have some work to do to be where we want to be. I thought we did pretty well overall. We have a couple things we want to tighten up going into next week. But, getting five in the top 10 is excellent."

Rochester, Culver Academy and Plymouth took the final three advancing spots on the girls side. Plymouth tied Northwestern with 151 points, but won the fifth advancing position on a sixth-runner score.

However, Taryn Thor will represent the Purple Tigers in the semistate after placing 14th in 20:33.2.

"I thought the girls ran really well," Northwestern coach Dave Stevens said.  "The tie-breaker to get out [didn't go our way], but this has been an outstanding year for our girls team. We've had a lot of successes. Taryn put in a great performance, and all of the girls came to run hard [Saturday] and they did that. We just got that one point that doesn't let us move on.”

Cass' Gabi Carney followed Thor in 15th at 20:33.7 to claim the final individual semistate ticket.

BOYS RACE

No. 6-ranked Warsaw put in a dominant performance to win the regional title, taking the top tree individual spots and seven of the top 21, by race winner Jacob Poyner, who finished in 15:54.4.

Western's Matt Grider led area runners with a fifth-place showing in 16:31.7, showing no ill effects of a recent injury in leading the Panthers to a third-place finish as a team. Rochester took second, while Culver and Carroll finished fourth and fifth respectively to claim the final two advancing spots.

"I think my ankle is 100 percent now," Grider said. "I took it easy for a week and it was about 90 percent for a while, but I think I'm back. [Saturday], my legs starling hurting at about the two-mile [mark], and I slowed down a little bit, but I was still fine."

Jacob Bradshaw added an 18th-place finish in 17:24.8, while Riley Worl (24th, 17:38.8), Caleb Maddox (31st, 18:01.4) and Austin Elliott (33rd, 18:03.8) aided the Panthers' cause.

"Third is about where I thought we'd be," Western coach Gary Jewell said. "I thought second place was a stretch goal, but we weren't that far behind Rochester. Warsaw is what Warsaw is. People have all kinds of opinions about how the alignment is now. This used to be a very competitive regional, but everybody is racing for second place now.  We're probably a year away from racing for second place. But, you can see how much we're improving. From Tuesday to [Saturday], you can see how much we moved up on the field."

Eastern and Kokomo will also be represented at the Logansport Sectional champion Lewis Duke took sixth for the Comets in 16:40.7, while teammate Adam Schaaf followed in 10th in 16:52.0, rounding out a superb day for the Eastern program.

"Coming in, I wanted Lewis to be top 5 and Adam to be top 10, so we're right where we needed to be place-wise," Mink said. "I know the guys were surprised that, as hard as they were running, their times weren't as good as Tuesday [in the sectional], but the wind was a bit of a factor. At this point, times don't make that much of a difference. Cross country is all about getting places. They got the places they needed, and that's all that really matters.”

Carroll's Brian Bordner finished in the No. 11 spot in 16:55.4, while Kokomo's Jeremy Breedlove took 13th in 17:08.1 for the Wildkats, who took seventh place as a team.

"We finished in seventh place after finishing ninth last year, and we beat a team [Saturday] that we hadn't previously, so we keep seeing improvement," Kokomo coach Ricke Stucker said. "Jeremy Breedlove will go on to the New Prairie Semistate, and four of our seven runners ran well. We were one point behind Logansport who killed us on a few other occasions this year. We were 16 points away from Carroll, who [took fifth to] qualify for the semistate. For a team with a lot of rookies we came a long way this season. I'm really happy with how.”