West Liberty-Salem’s Big Orange cross country teams enjoyed another impressive performance Saturday at the prestigious Tiffin Carnival Invitational.
The Big Orange girls finished third out of 42 teams in the Division III race, while the boys squad was fourth out of 33 teams.
Minster won the girls meet with 79 points, Liberty Center was second with 108, WL-S tallied 135 points, Ft. Loramie was fourth with 146 points and Margaretta was fifth with 231 points.
Senior Megan Adams powered the Big Orange by winning the girls race with a new personal-best time of 18:36.9.
“Megan ran a smart, controlled race,” said WL-S girls head coach Ann Vogel. “She made a strong move around the 2,500-meter mark and pulled away winning by 20 seconds. She looked mentally and physically tough on the course.”
Sophomores Ashley Yoder and Addison McCauley also finished in the top 15 for the girls team. Yoder was ninth in 19:31.9 and McAuley finished 15th in 20:14.3
Claire Longshore was 47th (21:18.5) for WL-S, Mandilyn Weaver finished 70th (21:55.6), Lily Smith finished 138th (23:34) and Maggie Davis was 165th (24:21.8).
“Overall, our team had a much improved performance from two weeks ago,” said Vogel.
“We’re not where we want to be yet, but there’s plenty of season ahead of us.”
In the girls Division II/III open race, Anna Knox led WL-S with a 15th-place finish (23:29.9), Dani Smith had a personal-best time of 24:23.1 for 49th, Joy Hudson was 98th (26:55.9) and Laney Craig was 133rd (28:10.8).
The Big Orange boys had 133 points for their fourth-place finish in the Division II race.
Carroll won with 92, Cuyahoga Valley Christian Academy was second with 115, Shelby finished third with 129 and Decatur Belmont took fifth with 180.
Senior standout Dylan Lauck led the Big Orange boys with a 10th-place finish (16:30.7).
Tate Yoder was close behind in 12th (17:47.2) and Owen Harrison was 21st (17:11.4).
Also for WL-S, Asher Knox took 37th (17:37 PR), Troy Bradley was 53rd (18:04.50 PR), Joey LaRoche was 56th (18:09) and Ayden Estep took 81st (18:29.4).
“It was a mixed bag collectively, but overall there were a lot of positives to take away from the meet for both the varsity and junior varsity teams,” said WL-S boys coach Mike Louden. “All three freshman (Asher, Troy, and Quentin) set big personal bests. Will now turn our attention to next week’s night race at Piqua.”
In the junior varsity boys open race for WL-S, Micah Smith was third (18:26.1), Quentin Rudolph took sixth (18:40.2 PR), Michael Jones finished 12th (19:47.7), Mason Barger finished 39th (20:41), Chandler McCafferty was 48th (21:02.4), Holden Shafer finished 56th (21:21.4) and Adam LaRoche was 85th (22:13.1).
Lady Raiders take 4th at Spencerville
Benjamin Logan’s cross country teams ran at the Spencerville Invitational on Saturday.
The Lady Raiders were fourth out of nine full teams. Parkway won the meet, South Adams of Indiana took second and Van Buren was third.
Sophomore Georgia Bates led Ben Logan by finishing fourth in a personal-best time of 20:32. Dani Widmark was 11th (21:40), Estella Wenger was 14th (21:54), Mylee Boysel was 30th (23:09), Malori Barnes finished 52nd (24:40), Kendra Kennedy was 55th (24:50) and Brooklyn Horner took 57th (24:58).
Also running for the Raiders were Allie Fay in 76th (26:57), Libby Siefring in 80th (27:14), Sarah Folk in 85th (27:44) and Hannah White in 91st (29:08). Ben Logan’s boys took ninth out of 12 full teams.
Eric Hughes led the Raiders with a 13th-place finishe (16:67). Aaron Rhoades was 46th (20:19), Eli Rhoades finished 48th (20:23), Landon Zehner finished 57th (20:57), Gabe Mooney was 72nd (22:26) and Devon Kimble took 87th (23:30).
BHS girls 7th at Spencerville
Bellefontaine’s girls cross country team placed seventh at the Spencerville Bearcat Invitational on Saturday.
Sophie Adelsberger was 31st (23:27.1) and Kaydin Lenhart was 32nd (23:27.1) to lead the Chiefs.
Also for BHS, Montanna Buck finished 33rd (23:31), Brianna Sechrest was 44th (24:16), Mia Delong was 46th (24:22), Aubrey Hudson finished 60th (26:03), Zoey Rister was 70th (25:45), Ella Reier was 74th (26:21), Maggie Howard finished 77th (26:57), Lizzy Foreman was 84th (27:43), Naomi Washburn finished 86th (27:51), Lexie Yoder was 89th (29:00) and Avery Hankins was 92nd (29:59).