Contributor: The Nerd
We're a bit off
We love the UNK meet and how UNK coach Brady Bonsall and his race day team allowed over 1,800 kids to compete over a very short timeframe. The UNK meet always falls on a Monday so we have had to adjust our normal routine to accommodate that.
Rankings are usually released on Tuesday. We released this week's pre-UNK rankings on Monday. I was supposed to post the rankings on X and Facebook prior to the race but I got caught up chatting with everyone once I arrived in Kearney. So... keep in mind that our Week 5 rankings are based on results through last Saturday and don't reflect any UNK results. Next week's rankings will look quite a bit different in a few classes.
This Nerdsletter is dropping a day late. I usually write it on Monday and Tuesday nights, but I lost most of my Monday writing session while I was driving back from Kearney. Thanks for your patience.
Photos
Last week was one of our slower shooting weeks but the Nerds continue to come through with quality albums. Since our last Nerdsletter we've posted pictures from Wahoo, Central City, Malcolm, Adams Central, Fort Calhoun, Ogallala, Lincoln North Star, Pender, Thayer Central and Nebraska City. We still owe you pics from Crofton, Ord and UNK. We took about 15,000 pictures at UNK so you're going to have to wait a few more days for those.
Here are a few highlights from last week:
The Nerds occasionally make last-minute decisions on whether to attend a meet, but we do our best to update our website at https://www.preprunningnerd.com/xcresults when we know in advance of Nerd plans.
Pushing back State?
Last week we shared a District qualification proposal that was submitted for the NSAA legislation process by the Wisner Pilger athletic director and XC coach. In addition to that proposal, the Papio La Vista athletic director was expected to meet the NSAA's October 1st deadline for a proposal to push back the date of the State XC meet. Because the NSAA calendar 'flipped' for the 2024/2025 academic year, the State meet will be held on October 25, five days later than last year. However, the State meet date will continue to move one or two days earlier for the next four or five years until the next time the NSAA schedule flips back a week. In the State Recap we posted after the 2023 meet, we briefly explored the pros and cons of moving back the date for future state meets.
To prepare this proposal, after last year's State meet Papio La Vista coach Joe Pilakowski asked for feedback from coaches and he received about 50 replies. The biggest concern came from central and western Nebraska coaches worried about the potential colder temps, frost on the ground, and the possibility that the Kearney Country Club would not let people on the course if it was too cold. The Papio La Vista proposal is a hybrid attempt to keep the championships out of November and at a consistent end-of-October date. Here's the proposal:
This proposal is calling for a change in the date of the State Cross Country Championships in the final 3 years of the 6-year NSAA calendar cycle. Each year the Championships are on the Friday of Week 16. Each year of the cycle, Week 16 becomes earlier and earlier in October that has impacted athlete safety in the championships because of high temperatures. Over the past 3 years, the temperature at 2pm in Kearney was 81, 75, and 70 degrees. Had the event been the following Friday in Week 17 the temperatures would have been 36, 57, and 59 degrees respectively. Overall, in the previous 6 year cycle the 2pm temperature in Kearney would have been approximately 12 degrees cooler for athletes the following Friday. During the previous 6 year time frame, no Friday in Week 17 was above 67 degrees in Kearney, while 2pm highs were 67 or higher 4 of those 6 years on its current Week 16 Friday. Moving the date back a week during the final 3 years of the cycle should likely provide a cooler, safer environment for athletes to participate in.
Nationwide, only 1 state, Alaska, currently has their state championships prior to Nebraska. Numerous states in our region have their championships at the end of Week 17 as proposed. Those include - North Dakota, Colorado, Kansas, and Iowa.
This proposal calls for no other changes in the Cross Country calendar. The start date would remain the same, districts would remain the same, but athletes and coaches would have an extra week of preparation between districts and State during those final 3 years of the calendar cycle.
The proposal will go through the NSAA process that allows for input from athletic directors, NSAA staff and the NSAA board. It should be about three months before we know the outcome of the proposal. Whether you're a coach for or against the proposal, please let your athletic director know your opinion so he/she can make an informed choice if the proposal is put up for a vote.
Rankings
As noted above, Week 5 rankings were issued on Monday and do not reflect the results of the UNK meet. You can find the Top 15 rankings and watch lists for every class for the entire season at https://www.preprunningnerd.com/rankings. That page also includes links to the coaches' polls for the entire season.
With so much talent at the UNK meet, our Week 6 rankings will place a heavy emphasis on the UNK results. However, one bad race doesn't negate four or five good weeks of racing, so we won't simply take the results from UNK and paste them into our rankings spreadsheets. Please also keep in mind that while the UNK meet is by far the largest meet in the State, it doesn't include every team. For example, Class A teams teams Lincoln North Star, Millard West and Lincoln Southwest were not at the meet, and Class D #1 Delani Runnels and her Niobrara-Verdigre team were also missing.
If you performed poorly at UNK and fell in the rankings, don't sweat it. It was just one meet. You have three weeks to rest, heal and mentally prepare yourself for State. And if you're still sweating it - rankings don't matter; you're cool simply because you run cross country.
UNK recap
The UNK results can be found at https://www.athletic.net/CrossCountry/meet/239217/info. Here's a brief recap of each race.
Class A boys
Class A was probably the most incomplete field at UNK. Lincoln North Star (LNS) and Lincoln Southwest competed last Thursday at the LNS meet while Millard West was at the Rim Rock meet on Friday and Saturday. For the Class A boys, it would have been particularly helpful to see how competitive LNS and Millard West would be against Fremont.
As expected, Fremont's Juan Gonzalez cruised to an easy victory, breaking away from the rest of the field at the downhill just past 2000 meters. At 3000 meters, he led by his teammate Noah Miller by 75 meters while Noah had a 5-meter lead on Conor Gross and Ryan Kugler of Omaha Westside. Gonzalez won in 15:31, Gross was 2nd in 16:19 followed by Miller (16:21), Kugler (16:27) and Kaden Boltz (16:43) of Grand Island. Fremont won the team race with 33 points followed by Papio South at 96 and Lincoln East at 108. Fremont's top seven placed 1st, 3rd, 8th, 10th, 11th, 20th and 25th. Their win was so dominating that they would have won the team race even without Gonzalez and Miller.
Papio South doesn't have the marquee names but they do have good depth, with their five scorers finishing in the top 28 spots. The top five Lincoln East boys placed 6th, 17th, 24th, 30th and 31st; I'd expect to see Papio South and Lincoln East fighting Millard West for third place at State.
Class A girls
The Class A girls race featured eight ranked athletes: #2 Abigail Burger (Kearney), #4 Mabel Henningsen (Marian), #5 Tatum Nielson (Bellevue West), #7 Abbi Durow (Millard South), #9 Grace Volzke (Elkhorn South), #10 Alexis Chadek (Papio La Vista), #14 Kari McClain (North Platte) and #15 Lucy Fierro (Westview). This was Henningsen's first race at the KCC course and she found herself in the lead at 1000 meters - not because she went out hard but because the rest of the ranked girls went out at a pedestrian pace.
Burger took control at the halfway point and established a 30-meter lead by 2800 meters, stringing out the field in the process. She was followed by Layla Phillips (Papio La Vista), Henningsen, Volzke, Durow and Nielson, with a gap of about five meters between those five girls. Burger substantially increased her lead over the final 2k, winning on her home course by 49 seconds in 18:53. Henningsen finished 2nd in 19:42 while Durow, Volzke and Nielson were close behind with sub-20:00 efforts. Burger and Henningsen have split their two matchups this season, and Henningsen's experience on Monday should help her at the State meet. Burger led Kearney to the team title.
The biggest surprise in the race, at least for me, was Layla Phillip's 7th-place finish. This is the junior's first cross country season; she played softball in the fall during her freshman and sophomore years while specializing in the hurdles during track season. She earned State medals in both hurdle races as a sophomore but appears to be pretty good at this distance thing. Her teammates Alexis Chadek finished 9th and Emma Wasilewski was 22nd. Gracie Suppes, who finished 9th at State last year, ran at UNK with a tremendous amount of K-tape on her knees. If she can get healthy, Papio La Vista could be a top-three team at State.
Class B boys
The UNK meet was our first chance this season to see a head-to-head-to-head matchup between the top three (and undefeated) runners in Class B: Braden Lofquest (Gretna East), Tommy Rice (Skutt) and Austin Carrera (Hastings). Rice went hard from the gun and had a small lead on Lofquest at the 1k mark while Carrera and Platteview's Esten Kohl were a meters further back. Lofquest had taken the initiative by the halfway point with Rice on his shoulder. At 3000 meters Carrera was 50 meters behind the duo, followed by 20-30 meter gaps between Jared Schroeder (Waverly), Lincoln Wolfe (Skutt), Michael Rodgers (Mount Michael) and a chase pack of medal contenders.
Lofquest pulled away over the final 2k to finish in 15:23 while Carrera chased down Rice to finish 2nd in 15:47. Rice struggled a bit over the final mile to finish 3rd in 16:07, and may or may have not blamed his fatigue on Saturday night's Homecoming festivities when he passed me with 400 meters remaining. Wolfe took 4th in 16:46 followed by Schroeder and Sam Robinson of Norris. Isac Portillo-Munoz finished 7th in 16:51, two days after running 16:32 at the huge Rim Rock meet in Lawrence, Kansas. Portillo-Munoz finished 9th at State as a freshman but had a slow start to the season; he appears to raced himself back into shape.
Skutt won the team title with 83 points while Plattsmouth (90 points) edged Gretna (93), Mount Michael (101), Hastings (104), Elkhorn (108) and Lexington (123) for 2nd. The only ranked teams not competing at UNK were #1 Pius and #7 Beatrice. Based on our limited sample size this season - when Pius, Skutt, Mount Michael and Gretna were at the Platte River Rumble - a healthy Pius seems to be the clear favorite for the Class B title.
Class B girls
The Class B girls race at the UNK meet was as close to a State preview as we can get. Monday's field including 13 of 15 ranked girls, with only Paityn Christoffels of Elkhorn North (ill) and Amalia Doty of Omaha Gross (team not entered) missing. Kendall Zavala and Atlee Wallman have traded the top spot in Class B over the first five weeks this season, and they quickly took the lead at 400 meters. They had a 50-meter lead over #3 Leah Robinson (Elkhorn North) at 3000 meters; Robinson was followed by Annah Perdue (York), Sophia Reynolds and Lydia Stewart (Platteview).
Robinson made a significant move over the next 1500 meters, turning a 50-meter deficit into a 50-meter lead by the 4600-meter mark. She finished with the fastest time of the day in 18:51. Zavala finished 2nd in 19:06 followed by Wallman (19:17), Perdue (19:29) and Reynolds (19:43).
There weren't many surprises in this race since the top 15 finishers had all been ranked at some point this season. Cece Kramper's (Duchesne) 12th-place finish was notable given that she had run only once in the last three a weeks - just one 3k run on a treadmill - due to a minor injury.
Elkhorn North edged Norris by one point, 28-29, and is the top-ranked team in the post-race coaches' poll. Elkhorn North's scorers finished 1st, 6th, 10 and 11th compared to 2, 3, 9 and 15 for Norris. As noted above, Elkhorn North was missing Paityn Christoffels, who by ranking is Elkhorn North's 3rd-fastest runner.
Class C boys
In contrast to absence of prior match ups of the top boys in Class B, the top three Class C boys have met a few times this year. Avery Carter (Milford) topped then-#4 Trevin Opp (Lincoln Christian) at Seward and then-#1 Tyler Hetz (Gothenburg) at the Minden meet. A few weeks later at Fillmore Central the finishing order was Hetz, Opp and Carter, and that was the rankings order headed into UNK.
There was no fast starter in this race. #10 Dayton Graves of Syracuse and #6 Kolby Tighe of Arlington led a huge pack of runners at the 1k mark with Hetz, Opp and Carter sitting safely in 10th-20th. Hetz broke open a 30-meter lead over Carter at 2500 meters, with Opp another 10 meters behind Carter. The first chase pack was at least 50 meters further back and included freshman Bryson Neels (Gothenburg), Kolby Tighe, Brier Cierny (North Bend Central), Sam Cederburg (Minden) and Yahriel Gaeta (Gothenburg).
With 400 meters remaining, Hetz had opened a 75-meter lead over Opp. Hetz clocked a 16:39 while Opp made up significant ground on the closing stretch, finishing just three seconds back. Carter took 3rd in 17:06 followed by #11 Charlie Evans (Aurora, 17:17) and #6 Kolby Tighe (17:18, Arlington). Two freshman - Sam McQuistan of Holdrege and Neels of Gothenburg - took the next two spots.
Three ranked athletes - #5 Payton Day of Omaha Concordia, #7 Miles Clausen of Battle Creek and #14 Elijah Polard of Ord - and their schools did not compete at UNK. I also don't believe #8 Nolan Engel of Lincoln Christian started the race. With 4th through 11th place at UNK decided by less than 14 seconds, we should have a pretty exciting fight for medals at the State meet.
In the team race, top-ranked Gothenburg scored 55 to win ahead of 4th-ranked Aurora (98) and 5th-ranked Syracuse (105). Holdrege and Minden were ranked 2nd and 3rd going into the meet but will have some work to do to challenge Gothenburg the next time they race in Kearney. Lincoln Christian finished in 12th place with 200 points but would have improved their score by around 90 points if Nolan Engel had finished with his normal result.
Class C girls
This race offered the most mystery of the eight races since top-ranked Hailey O'Daniel of Arlington had only raced against two other ranked girls this season - #8 Alexa Warner and #13 Aclynn Osterbuhr of Minden. The UNK featured 13 of the 15 ranked runners, missing only Autumn Gasper of Boone Central (team not competing) of Boone Central and Sawyer Benne (ill) of Lincoln Lutheran.
Zoey Smith of Ashland Greenwood led the pack for the first 400 meters followed by O'Daniel and a tight pack of ranked runners. Second-ranked Alexis Ericksen (Aurora) took a slight lead over Smith at the 1000-meter mark, followed by a group that included O'Daniel, #4 Emma Williams (North Bend Central), #5 Liston Crotty (Auburn) and previously-ranked Scout Bell (Gothenburg). Third-ranked Avery Heinrich, a freshman at Scotus, was another 30 meters back, a smart start for her first race on the KCC course.
By 2700 meters the leaders were strung out. O'Daniel led with Bell a few steps back, Ericksen was running solo another 20 meters behind, and the trio of Crotty, Heinrich and Williams lagged by another 30 meters. O'Daniel gapped Bell by the 3000-meter mark while Bell maintained her lead over the other four contenders. #7 Brenna Benjamin of Holdrege ran alone in 7th place, another 40 meters behind the Crotty group.
The 'Hill' located just beyond the two mile mark appeared to shake up the field. By the time the runners reached the final turn with 400 meters remaining, O'Daniel had a 75-meter lead over Ericksen and Benjamin. Heinrich and Bell ran together another 50 meters back, and they were 30 meters ahead of Crotty. O'Daniel took the title in 19:53, followed by Ericksen (20:15), a hard-charging Bell (20:16), Heinrich (20:18), Benjamin (20:20) and Crotty (20:29).
Hannah Heinrich and Emilyn Kavan finished 8th and 9th to help Scotus nab the team title with 58 points. However, 2022 and 2023 runner-up Auburn was just three points behind with four girls in the top thirty. Gothenburg was the top-ranked team entering the meet but appeared to compete with Adaline Pinkston, who was ranked 12th in Week 3 of the season before missing the last few meets. Fifth-ranked Minden finished 3rd at UNK, powered by freshman Aclynn Osterbuhr in 12th and sophomore Alexa Warner in 13th. Minden's next two finishers were freshmen, which suggests two things: (a) they'll run better at State and (b) Minden is going to be a contender for at least the next few years.
There were not many surprises in this race. The top 15 finishers had earned rankings during this season and they should all be in the hunt for a State medal in three weeks.
Class D boys
We love the Class D boys field but, with all due respect, Mason McGreer and Eli Goodell of Perkins County have dominated this division for most of the past two seasons. Mason and Eli finished 1st and 2nd at the 2023 UNK and State meets, and they have been the top two finishers at each of their meets this season. The new wrinkle this year is that, after Mason's undefeated XC season last fall, he and Eli have split the wins during their first four races this season heading into UNK.
At the 1000-meter mark, #10 Dawson Meyer (Oakland Craig) led a loose pack that included #4 Kaser Johnson and #6 Tice Yost of Doniphan-Trumbull, #3 Jacob Swanson of Nebraska Christian and #12 Austin Benda of Hemingford. Consistent with their previous races at the KCC course, Mason and Eli started conservatively and were 30 meters behind the leaders at the 1k mark.
A hard-charging lead pack of the top four ranked runners had formed by the midway point (above), with Eli Goodell and Kaser Johnson pushing the pace. Tice Yost trailed by 20 meters, Dawson Meyer was another 30 meters back, and Dawson had a 20-meter lead on #5 Jobjosiah Muthiani (Freeman) and previously-ranked Samuel Holsing (Tri-County).
The Perkins County boys separated from the field by 4600 meters (above), with the younger Goodell appearing to start his kick from at least 600 meters out. McGreer used his track speed to garner the win, finishing two seconds ahead of Goodell with a 16:20. Doniphan-Trumbull captured the next two spots with Kaser Johnson (16:46) and Tice Yost (17:29). Austin Benda finished 5th in 17:30, just 0.3 seconds ahead of fast-closing #9 Dimitri Pettit of North Platte St. Pat's.
Perkins County (29) took the win over two-time defending State champion St. Pat's (38) and Doniphan-Trumbull (48). Nebraska Christian finished in 4th with 75 points despite Jacob Swanson's DNF. Swanson has been one of Class D's most consistent performers the past three years, had won all four of his races this year before UNK, and broke the Palmer Invite course record six days before UNK. The DNF is an anomaly. He'll be competitive at State.
The race included 12 of the 15 ranked boys. We didn't have #8 Andrew Martin (West Holt), #13 Jayden Fuehrer (McCool Junction) and #14 Sullivan Jackson (Cornerstone Christian).
Class D girls
The Class D race featured 11 ranked girls. We didn't have #1 Delani Runnels (Niobrara-Verdigre), #5 Kayleigh Betka and #12 Leah Dawson of McCool Junction, and #14 Callie Fisher (Lutheran Northeast). We were pumped for this race because it offered the first opportunity of the season for the top girls from Western and South Central Nebraska to race one another.
#11 Angela Frick of North Central had an aggressive start, building a 40-meter lead at 1000 meters over a pack that included #2 Ashley Robertson (Wallace), #8 Madison Shaw (Sandy Creek), #9 Sage Holtmeier (Tri County), #10 Lily Daly and #15 Emery Vargas (Hastings St. Cecilia). Shaw, Holtmeier and Daly are freshmen who have raced multiple times this season.
By 2500 meters Robertson had taken a 10-meter lead over Frick, the freshmen trio were 20 meters back, and previously-ranked Lilly Harris (Homer) and Vargas were another 20 meters behind. With 400 meters to go, Robertson had grown her lead to 40 meters over Holtmeier and Daly, with Shaw trailing by another 10 meters. Holtmeier conjured up a final push to make up the gap with Robertson. While Holtmeier and Robertson both finished with the same time of 20:29.8, Holtmeier was credited with the win. Daly took third in 20:38, Shaw was fourth in 20:53, and Frick closed hard to edge Lilly Harris for 5th with both clocking 21:02.
Second-ranked Hemingford is the two-time defending State champion and they won the team title with 34 points with scorers Dakota Horstman (10th), Aurora Hinman (11th) and Ainslee Woltman (17th). 6th-ranked Nebraska Christian was second (49 points) with 12th-place Grace Nokelby, 17th-place Addie Eddison and 27th-place Isabelle Brumbaugh. Third-ranked Mullen finished 7th in a performance that was unusual for them this season; their team leader #3 Peyton Paxton had a rare off day to finish 20th. Top-ranked McCool Junction competed at Rim Rock on Saturday rather than UNK.
The State team race is going to be tight. Hemingford and McCool Junction will likely go into the meet as the favorites but at least six teams have a legitimate shot at earning one of the two trophies.
Results
As always, last week's results are posted at https://www.preprunningnerd.com/xcresults. We are missing results from Adams Central (a timing issue is being worked out) and Doniphan-Trumbull. When we don't have meet results, those can't be factored into our rankings.
Notable results from other meets
At the Mount Michael meet on 9/24, Atlee Wallman of Norris won in 19:01 ahead of Leah Robinson (Elkhorn North, 19:15), Kendall Zavala (Norris, 19:15) and Kailey O'Brien (Elkhorn North, 19:33). This race featured at least 10 girls ranked or formerly ranked which... happens almost every time Norris and Elkhorn North are at the same meet. Elkhorn North won the team title over Norris 22 to 26. On the boys' side, Sam Robinson of Norris won his first varsity race in 16:35 and earned a promotion from the Nerd watch list to #14. He was followed by Michael Rodgers (Mount Michael), Calin O'Grady (Bennington) and Mesach Nkurubujango (Mount Michael), all of whom have been ranked this year.
The Malcolm meet on 9/24 was a nice preview of the UNK meet for both the boys and girls. Avery Carter of Milford won in 16:20, one second ahead of Trevin Opp of Lincoln Christian. Nolan Engel of Lincoln Christian, Dayton Graves of Syracuse, Charlie Evans of Aurora and Jobjosiah Muthiani of Freeman all finished under 17:00. In the girls race, Alexis Ericksen of Aurora nabbed her third title of the season with a 20:13, finishing ahead of the three ranked Scotus girls - Avery Heinrich, Emilyn Kavan and Hannah Heinrich. The Syracuse boys were a surprising 8-point winner over Lincoln Christian while the Scotus girls edged Aurora by two points.
At Thursday's Lincoln North Star meet, Class A#2 North Star scored 37 points to edge B#1 Pius by 9 points in a five-scorer meet. Class A#2 Josiah Bitker won in 15:57 followed Class B#3 David Krier (Pius, 16:03), A#3 Easton Zastrow (North Star, 16:15), A#5 Kaden Boltz (Grand Island, 16:17) and B#5 Joe Majerus (Pius, 16:18). North Star's four ranked boys finished 1-3-6-7 at this meet; they'll need a strong finish from their fifth runner to challenge Fremont at HAC and State. Fourth-ranked Marian freshman Mabel Henningsen grabbed her third season title in 19:17, followed by B#4 Annah Perdue (York, 19:24), A#5 Tatum Nielson (Bellevue West, 19:30) and A#6 Meredith Marsh (LSW, 19:53).
The KU Rim Rock meet in Lawrence is arguably the most competitive out-of-state meet that Nebraska schools attend. Consequently, Millard West's girls title last Saturday is incredibly impressive. In the 25-team large-school Gold division, Millard West scored 109 points to Denver East's 163. Kate Ebmeier was the top Millard WEst finisher in 18:31 for 9th place while Litzey Fredette finished 16th in 18:54. The Rim Rock course is fast but it's not flat so the sub-19:00 results are impressive.
In the boys large-school division, Michael Jones was Millard West's top finisher in 22nd with a 16:14. Henry Hansen cracked the top 50 with his 16:42.
In the smallest-school Blue division, the McCool Junction girls placed 14th paced by Kayleigh Betka (5th, 20:10) and Leah Dawson (9th, 20:20). McCool Junction was the only team in the Blue race with two top-ten finishers but as a Class D school they struggled with the five-scorer format. On the boys side, Jayden Fuehrer of McCool Junction finished 16th in 17:09.
As it has for the past few years, Lexington ran at KU on Saturday and then UNK on Monday. The Lex boys finished 5th in the not-big-not-small Crimson division, led by Isac Portillo-Munoz in 9th place (16:32) and Herson Rodriguez in 27th place (17:08).
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First published at www.preprunningnerd.com by Jay Slagle on October 2, 2024. If you find an error, shoot us an e-mail at jayslagle@hotmail.com and we'll get it fixed.
Like this coverage of the Nebraska cross country scene? There's more of this at www.preprunningnerd.com. Check out the Blog tab for our frequent stories and the Results tab for every Nebraska high school meet we can find. If you want to see meet photos or just need to kill a few hours on social media, follow us on Twitter and Instagram @PrepRunningNerd or on Facebook at www.facebook.com/preprunningnerd.
Finally, if you think runners, jumpers and throwers are the best things on earth, you'll enjoy our two most popular articles. In 2018 we published "The Runner with the Broken Heart" about a high school boy who finished last in nearly every race he ran. In 2022 we published, "The Fall and Rise of Emmett Hassenstab," a story about a high school triple jumper who became a quadrapalegic after a swimming accident.