States Analysis AAA Team Stories!

 Let me start off by saying congratulations to all of the runners who competed at States this past weekend. It's a fantastic meet and I felt truly honored to run their my senior year. I think the competition this year was fierce and everyone ran really well.

Also thank you so much to Ryan Mucha of DTW who helped out by posting live updates on the blog. He did a really great job and I greatly appreciated all of his help on race day.

States was very slow this season, and I’m not totally sure why that is just yet. Runners on Friday were telling me how the course was in perfect condition. I heard it was pretty hot for an XC race and that could have hurt, but it also looked like a lot of guys went out really hard in that first mile, getting too excited to a fast race and then died. 

A ton of story lines to discuss, so I’ll slowly post them up over the next few days!

Also, for those looking towards NXN and FL Regionals I will be doing a preview for both of those races next Sunday after NJ’s Meet of Champions, and New England’s huge race.

Just one more reminder that I am looking to do state stories similar to Etrain did last season with any medalists that would like to participate. I am trying to message everyone on facebook that I can find, but if you'd like to help me out and e-mail me as well that'd be great. fk246898@muhlenberg.edu is how you can contact me.

I guess the most obvious place to start is with West Chester Henderson. They break the tie breaking streak with an unbelievable score of 60 points! Great call to RJJL on that one. Reiny Barchet knew he’d have to be in the top 5 and did just that. Russell repeats with a very strong performance and the fastest time of the day. He’s clearly in incredible shape. Alex Knapp continues to run very well and grabbed a medal for himself, while Waltz, Collins, and Stratman packed it together perfectly, although I believe Collins placed higher last season. I cannot wait to see what they’ve got coming for regionals. Tony Russell definitely has placed himself in PA distance royalty with his second straight gold and bringing the team two Gold’s back to back. I believe WCH is now the only team in AAA boys (I keep it limited to that since I don’t know much about the girls) who has won back to back years with the same team and individual.  

The next big story for me is Nick Smart and Cardinal O’Hara. Smart ran extraordinarily well to place 11^th overall after barely running all season. Everyone has given him flack for being an 800 guy who can’t run XC and he is proving them wrong. Jim Belfatto, I thought, was capable of grabbing a medal, but placed 27^th overall. Even so this squad looks great and they showed last season they can peak well for Regionals and Nationals. I have no doubt now that they’ll beat NA after only losing to them by a few points. Kevin James had a really nice for 4^th overall. I doubted a little bit that he could mix it up out front like that, but he did a great job and I’m glad he’s had his first really big states race. Also, was just talking to someone about indoor… this team’s DMR is going to be scary.

NA – They had the 23 second spread, but it just wasn’t enough to match the fire power of Barchet and Russell up front. This team didn’t have the high medal finisher’s necessary, and I knew they’d need 3 to 4 medalists to take down Henderson and they only had two. Cordon Louco stepped up much like Josh Zemet did for this team last season and as a senior lead the squad. He hasn’t done that all season. I do hope these guys head over to NXN regionals for next season’s sake, plus who knows the Northeast could get two bids this season (top 2 teams are auto-Q’s). In the end they still got second place at the state meet which is incredible and they return 4 fantastic runners for next season.

I’ve done a lot of team stuff, so I guess I’ll continue on that route and go down the list. State College! WOW did this team come up big at the state meet. A group of 800 runners came together to run 5k and do it well to prepare themselves for track and oh boy did they succeed. I often say that young runners get nervous and don’t perform as well at the state meet, but the opposite was true to the SC boys. Milligan ran a fantastic race and was right behind Golembeski, and Nick Feffer their freshman PR’d!!! Who the heck PR’s at Hershey? Feffer was a sprinter who came out for XC to get in shape for indoors and outdoors, but he’s turned into a distance stud. Cather grabbed the last medal spot as I predicted as well and I think they had a really great day. They’ll be a scary relay team as well.

Council Rock North – I really wanted to pick them to get 4^th place, but I was afraid of looking favoritist on the blog for my alma mater. Ross Wilson had a very solid race to place 3^rd and I can’t wait to see him do work at FL regionals. I have to give a big shout out to my little, Brian Arita. He ran a very smart race, knowing people would go out too hard, and cleaned up in the last 800m to place 38^th overall. Great race buddy! Griswold had a comeback race after not running well during Districts and beat out Simmons. Simmons put together a solid season for doing AAU over the summer and not starting XC training until September. This team has a good future as well with Tim Haas running very solid as a 5^th man. 

Carlisle is making me look pretty good by tie-ing and scoring just one point better than I expected. Brehm had a very solid race overall and he has clearly improved during XC. I think this will help his strength a lot and I’m excited to see him run some 3k’s and 3200’s this season on top of the 8 and mile. Although State College got them by 37 points Jon Carroll and Sean Collin’s didn’t have great races and I think they could have dropped their score by around 10 to 20 points otherwise. It’s tough coming off of districts to finish well at the state meet, but I thought Carlisle did very well with that. I’m thinking they’ve got some good relay potential as well, but it helps when you’ve got an anchor like Brehm.

Conestoga – This team had a very interesting race overall. First off Andrew Marston raced like an animal out there. I would have been open to put him in the medaling conversation, but 9^th place overall?? That’s absolutely incredible. Seemed as though he was pack running and helping his team run well at Districts and unleashed it all for the state meet. Going to be a guy to watch in the future. His team had a fantastic pack at districts, but it really fell apart on the hills at Hershey when a few of the squad didn’t have very good days. Marston’s 7 points really helped keep this team down. It was their first time at the state meet however and they only lose their #2 guy Sjoreen next season. They’ll be a team to watch in the future. I’m not sure about their relay potential, but I’m sure they’ll be able to put together a sub 8 4x8 team.

Mt Lebo – This squad really peaked at the right time and even with Gunzenhauser as their 3^rd man they still placed well. Front to back everyone had really solid races on this team as they kept their pretty tight spread and ran well. Hatton was 19:10 and I’d have to guess that he fell with that type of a time. A real shame as he was another strong piece for the team. With that great competition I’m thinking they have relay potential as well.

Penncrest – Well Chris Kazanjian wanted to come out and prove he was a top PA runner and I think he did that very well this weekend with a 6^th place finish. He went out a litter faster than normal, but still 5 seconds behind the main pack after a mile and worked his way up per-usual. Matt did the same thing but went out in 5 flat. He came back really well, but it was just a bit late as he placed the dreaded 26^th, which kills me a bit inside. These twins are really great kids. As a team their 3-5 packed it in very nicely once again and did what they had to help this team beat out Pennsbury I don’t know if the Kazanjian twins are going to FL, but the course would really place to their strengths and they would have an outside shot at making it to nationals, especially Chris. 

Pennsbury – You can tell me Sam Webb isn’t peaking too early, ect and rip me for those comments, but he placed higher last season as a sophomore.  And ran faster… He did have a nice race overall though and got a medal once again as a junior which is still impressive. This team had a nice showing and the Wick brothers will be a good help to this team next season that only loses their #3 in Liam O’Connell.

Fox Chapel – Colin got the best of Ethan once again and had a really nice overall finish of 7^th at the state meet. It’s a very strong year in PA, and I think these twins should do pretty well at FL regionals. Ethan will just keep getting better as the weeks pass by since he’s coming off of injury. Brendon Urso didn’t race as well as he did at districts otherwise this team could have beaten Mount Lebanon, but he’s only a sophomore and this team has a decent future without the Martin twins in the coming years. 

Freedom – Ok, you guys can rip me on this one, I totally thought that these guys would be at least top 7 despite their youth and inexperience, but it was not to be. Ben Ziegler has stayed consistent all season and was their top guy by a lot, running a very good race. Dan Quigley on the other hand has been very up and down, and it just wasn’t his, or Chris Kelly’s day as they went from 2-3 to 4-5. If they’re up in the 17:15’s or faster with Alpaugh as the 5^th at 17:35 this team would have done very well. They only lose Kelly next season, and Isaac Gross has big potential for improvement as just a freshman. This was a good learning experience for them. 

Cumberland Valley – They had a tough race after a fantastic run at the D3 championships. Hershey once again getting to them, but they ran solid for a very young team. I really like Seeber, Soliman, and Higgins as returning underclassman on this top 5. They’re very well coached and will most likely be the class of District 3 next season as far as teams go. 

Lower Dauphin – After winning a district title and losing your #1/2 guy in Jeff Groh it must have been very tough and demoralizing to race the weekend after, especially on the same brutal Hershey course. Nissley hung in really nicely and placed 16^th overall. I’ve been saying it all year and I’ll say it again, his consistency is almost uncanny. The rest of the squad ran pretty good races and Colton Cassel is another freshman to watch out for (I’ll be doing a little post on their class later on)

Twin Valley – Another junior dominated squad that raced pretty well… This day was really all about getting experience for TV and I think they did a nice job, although their pack fell apart a bit. Digiacomo ran a really fantastic race and if he can develop into a true front runner next season this squad will be pretty dangerous.

Parkland – Again with the young teams! Daniel Kyvelos has had a breakout season and ended it on a high note, in my opinion. I think he’ll be very dangerous in the future. They’ll need to improve at the 4-5 positions next season, but Mike Geiger is another good freshman out there.

I really don’t know what to say about Wallenpaupack, McDowell and Carrick. Hoping District 8 and 10 combine at least on the AAA level with District 7.

-That's all for Now Folks! Expect to see AAA Individual Analysis and story lines up later tonight

--ForrestCRN