Montezuma-Cortez High School and Mancos High School sent their cross-country teams to regionals in Delta on Wednesday.
The Mancos girls were second place in 2A Region-4, and qualified for the state meet as a team for the fourth consecutive year. Mancos also qualified Brandon McKie and Justin Burton for the 2A boys state meet. State will be held in Aurora.
In 4A Region-5 action, M-CHS and its young runners had its season come to an end.
We were real thin this year in terms of our experience, M-CHS coach Paul Koops said. The kids that ran for us, 11 of them had personal bests, which I thought was really admirable. I thought they ran as well as they could.
Mancos competed against seven other schools, including Crested Butte Community, Debeque, Lake City Community, Meeker, Ouray, Rangely and Telluride.
Rachel Beverlin finished in sixth place to lead the Lady Bluejays with a time of 21 minutes, 18 seconds. She was followed closely by Kristin Adams in seventh place at 21:45. Danika Evensen (22:51) and Devin Kroeker (22:54) finished in 11th and 12th respectively.
The girls individual champion was Rachel Hampton from Telluride, who finished in 18:28. The team regional champions were the Telluride Miners.
For the Mancos boys, Burton, a sophomore, led the way, finishing the course in 17:51, which was good for 13th place. He was followed by McKie in 15th place and a time of 18:09. Zane Willburn finished up the team score with a time of 19:49 and a 24th-place finish. The individual champion on the boys side was Ty Williams from Telluride, who completed the course in 16:05. The boys champions were the Telluride Miners. Mancos finished fifth.
Telluride, Crested Butte and Rangely all qualified for state as teams.
I was very impressed with our runners today, Mancos coach Brady Archer said. Almost everyone ran a personal record today with some of them running faster by over a minute than they had ever run before. It was great to see them step up in a pressure situation like regionals, where they need to run their best in order to qualify for the state meet. It is hard to pick out any one performance, because they all stepped up in their own way to help their teammates. Our runners came into this meet a bit overlooked on both the girls and boys sides, and I think they did a nice job of representing the Mancos community and the school. Now, we will have a week and a half to get ready for the state meet. Most of these runners have run there before, which always helps.
The Colorado High School Activities Association 2A Cross Country State Championships will be Saturday, Oct. 29, at the Arapahoe County Fairgrounds in Aurora. The girls will race at 9:30 a.m., and the boys will race at 11:30 a.m.
The M-CHS Panthers were led by junior Dillon Wells 22nd place finish of 17:41.
Dillons been a great leader for us, Koops said. Hes run real well for us this year. He was really close to being in that top group (top-15 qualify for state) at the regional. I think with the right work during the offseason, I think he can break into that.
Other times for the boys were Jonathan Bloedel (75th), 19:38; Stephen Garner (78th), 19:55; Chandler Dee (79th), 19:55; and, Mack Carter (89th), 22:18.
Craigs Moffat County High School defended its regional championship, and Alfredo Lebron won the boys individual title in 15:47 for Moffat County.
Battle Mountain, an Edwards school, won the girls team and individual championships. Mandy Ortiz took the top time in 18:46.
Freshman Rachel Demby had the best finish for the Lady Panthers, taking 54th in a time of 22:04. Other finishes for the M-CHS girls include Kia Baikie (69th), 23:18; Abby Lock (71st), 23:23; Elana Cope (78th), 25:08; Meggie Curtis (83rd); 26:20; and, Selena LaPaz (88th), 27:28.
I think the best thing we can say about the whole girls team is its a very young and inexperienced team, Koops said. With the addition of a few youngsters next year, I think well be competitive in the coming years.
Koops feels his team overall did well in a rebuilding year.
For us, it was a season of focusing mostly on personal bests and running as well as we could, he said. Sometimes, I think our kids are a little bit shocked by how much talent there is out there. I hope that they see that talent, see that ability, and realize that comes from hard work. They can get there with the same kind of hard work.