Marist Girls Repeat, Fend Off Challenge from Lakeside-Evans, Anna Bowles Gets Redemption in Individual Title
The Lady War Eagles ran very well at Carrollton in adding another 1st place Cup to the stuffed trophy case back at school, but did they ever had to earn it. Lakeside-Evans brought their A Game and absolutely left it all out on the course Saturday making a statement for next season. In a previous meet, running head to head at Double Dip only 11 points separated these with Marist being a much deeper squad early in the season. LS-Evans came out strong led by their fleet trio of Team Bowles (Anna & Sarah) and Katie Townsend going 1, 5, 6 while Marist began packing it in across the finish line with 4 runners in the top 12 beginning with Megan Mavity's 3rd place 19:05 followed by teamates Sophie Harkins and Kate Northrup's 8 and 9 points and Chelsea Fetter's 12. But, the Lady Panthers made it very interesting thanks huge pr's by Tara Morgan and Carolyn Hemectan coming up just short of the win. Winder-Barrow ran true to form finishing a strong 3rd placing 4 girls in the top 15 as the Lady Bulldoggs were ranked at that position most of the regular season. Amanda Cope, Rebecca Gregory and Caitlin Connell all turned in sub 20: performances. Whitewater also held serve as they claimed the final podium spot with 125 points and 21:07 average team time. The Lady Panthers ran in a tight pack placing all 5 scorers in between positions 20-31. Leading the prowl was Stacy Mangan in 20:57 with Haley Hunt close behind in 21:00.
Anna Bowles had been in this scenario all too often last year on the XC course and Mondo tracks. Taking the lead and controlling the race as Meghan Wetterhall sat on her, and near the end picked her spot and took victory away. It was not to be on this day, as Bowles again took the race out, cotrlolled it and kept separation holding off a brief challenge from Wetterhall only this time gradually pulling away the final 800 meters to a comfortable margin of victory in the 3rd best performance of the day in 18:28.59. Wetterhall was a very strong 2nd in 18:45 and had a great October after battling illness the first half of the season. Meghan's running mate, Anna Kelly of LS-DeKalb had a fantastic season herself and capped it off by placing 4th in 19:08.06 just nipping LS-Evans' Frosh Sarah Bowles at the line who had a superb race in 19:18.69 with Townsend breathing down both their necks in 19:19.39. Cope of Winder-Barrow placed 7th with a 19:33, followed by Marist's Harkins (19:41), Northrup (19:51) and WB's Gregory in 19:54.
War Eagles Own Mile 3 in Repeating as 4A Champs
Coach Eric Heintze was prophetic a couple of months ago when personally responded on the Forum to the Community involving a team issue, "Look for us to be strong at the end of the season and State". Marist actually was stronger than everyone by Double Dip according to meet results and the weekly rankings but their performance on the course Saturday affirmed what most of us already knew. that the Marist system works not unlike other programs as Westminster, Brookwood, Collins Hill, etc..Without a top gun, Marist did it by placing 3 of their guys in the top 8 positions and the entire squad moving up several positions on Mile 3 enroute to scoring only 45 points. Packing it in with a :08 spread was Charlie Fetter placing 3rd in 16:44, Dylan Moore in 16:50 and Matt Weber in 16:52. The good news for this bunch according to the data is all return next Fall! Lakeside-DeKalb had a nice race placing a very strong 2nd with 76 points placing 3 runners in the top 10 scorers including Individual runnerup John Ewing in 16:31, Charlie Clark taking 6th overall in 16:52 and David Dixon in 17:04. Lakeside-Evans ran well as a pack placing 4 guys inside positions 16-26 with a :17 spread to tally 133 points along with an average team time of 17:31. The Panthers were paced by Shane Wilson's 16th place 17:12. McIntosh fought hard enough to take the 4th and final spot on the Stage behind LS-Evans as Carl Eifert led the way in 23rd place clocking a 17:25 followed by John Janigian with a 17:25 in 27th.
Their was a serious matchup going on for the Individual title as John Ewing of Lakeside-DeKalb took the lead on the back part of the course near Mile 1 with a few others in tow including Henry Stevens-Carty and Corbin Williams of Allatoona, teamate Charlie Grant, Aaron Worthy of Heritage and Westside-Augusta's D'Andre Smalley. Beginning the 2nd loop Smalley had tucked himself in behind Ewing and they put on a show with Smalley making a move up the final hill passing Ewing and jetted down the hill across the finish line for his 1st GHSA State title in 16:27 followed by John in 16:31. Others in the top 10 not mentioned above were Monroe-Area's Spencer Cape who had a breakout performance taking 4th place in 16:48, Warren Enriquez of Starrs Mill placing 7th in 16:52, Aaron Coleman of Stockbridge placing 9th in 16:56 and Northgate's Bret Eady rounding out the 4A All-State team with a 16:57 performance.