Griffin Molino, the defending A champion, came into this meet with a ton of momentum and a target on his back. The Senior had a strong season, highlighted by a 15:18 at Lehigh (especially impressive considering he was racing the state's best guys in their own backyard) and set his sights on Russell's state record at Hershey.
Meanwhile the team battle was up for grabs with Sewickley, Seneca and Northeast Bradford sharing favorite status with Elk Lake, Winchester Thurston and Mercyhurst Prep waiting to be spoilers.
At one mile, Molino was at the front and with him was Sebastian Curtin, the #2 returner from last year. JDL from Masterman was out front and so too was Domenic Peretta, a sleeper pick and two-time state champion on the track last May. Elk Lake was tied with Winchester Thurston in the team standings. Winchester Thurston's biggest weakness coming into the state meet was their lack of a 5th man. However, at the mile the team had a very capable top 5. Elk Lake had it's own capable pack with 6 guys in the top 30 in team scoring. Sewickley, the WPIAL champs, were back in 6th as their guys didn't get out as hard as some of their rivals.
At two miles the team race had been broken open. WT found themselves with 5 in the top 20 of team scoring, Elk Lake still sat in 2nd, but the gap was growing and their pack was slipping a bit. NE Bradford and Sewickley were chasing them down. Meanwhile, Molino had broken free of his competitor Curtin and put the chase on the record. He was 9:53 at 3200m, Curtin was 10 flat. Three D7 guys rounded out the top 5 as Mackey moved into third with Loevner and Trimble in pursuit. Another two D7 guys rounded out the top 7. The Camp Hill boys made a nice move on mile 2 and got two guys up into the medals.
At the finish Winchester Thurston held together their dominate top 5. They scored an incredible 65 points and finished with two guys in the top 10 overall, Loevner and Littman. Both guys return. They only lose Landin Delaney (37th overall) from this squad for next year. In second was Sewickley, behind the huge day from Griffin Mackey, running 16:09 as just a sophomore. NE Bradford ended up third as Garrett Smith couldn't quite end up in the medals. Elk Lake lacked the front running to edge their way into the top 3.
Molino just missed the record running 15:46, Sebastian Curtin also broke 16 in a fantastic performance.
Here's my 5 quick thoughts
1. The story here has gotta be Winchester Thurston's dominating win. The big knock on these guys at Districts was that they don't have 5 guys. They were a young team that would be depending on a big day from freshman at the 4 spot and a big step up day from their 5. They were kind of like the Henderson of A, certainly a dangerous situation. However, Shaun Hay emerged after not racing at districts (and apparently he hasn't raced or trained for most of the season) and gave the team an incredibly clutch 43rd overall finish. They surprised Sewickley Academy (who had a very strong day to finish 2nd) and got themselves in the argument for a top 10 team in the state. Keep in mind that without Hay, they would have scored around 140 points and ended up in a tight 4-5 battle (when you remove the extra team scorers I think Elk Lake edges them out, they also had the 6th man tie breaker to their advantage). So Hay was the difference between a dominating state title win and a 5th place finish. Amazing. But of course Littman and Loevner deserve a lot of credit, they were fantastic at states. Throw in an incredibly clutch run from Freshman Tristan Forsythe and this team earned that state title.
2. Molino had a fantastic run. Given the events of the AAA race, his run will be overshadowed, but he almost soloed his way to the record. If you look at the other times that were sub 15:50 in Hershey history, I'm not sure there were any that were this dominate. Brophy's time will be most impressive of the day, but Molino's hasn't gotten the credit it deserves. We will see what he does when he returns to NXN.
3. Griffin Mackey deserves a lot of credit. He looked like he was heading backwards a bit honestly with a tough loss to Peretta at leagues and a surprise third at Districts. He is only a sophomore, but he wasn't intimidated or phased by the big stage or disappointment previous weeks. His time is right around what Brophy ran last year for perspective. He also dominated some seriously quality guys in Loevner, Peretta and Trimble over the last mile. 4th was 14 seconds behind him. Mackey led a crew of 7 sophomore medalists! Among those medalists were Sebastain Curtin's little brother Noah who had a fantastic run to finish 11th, Ben Littman, the #2 man on state champ WT, and Hunter Crawley the South Williamsport sophomore looking to follow in Griffin Molino's footsteps. The South Williamsport story in general is amazing. It's not even an official school sport there and they end up with two state medalists and the state champ. Also medaling as sophomores were the fantastic Meyers twins from Seneca finishing 15th and 18th.
4. District 7 was loaded. They had a dominating performance this meet with the top two teams and 5 of the top 8 overall finishers. 4 of those 5 return again next year. And remember that Avonworth (White Race champs earlier this year at Pre States) and Sacred Heart (another very strong team led by 26th overall finisher Ryder Ballou) were not even participating in the meet and both had top 5 potential given their experience and talent.
5. Penns Valley had a 14 second spread for 8th, but nobody in the top 40 of team scoring. Elk Lake had a 20 second spread for 4th but ended up with no one in the top 20. Meanwhile the top two teams each had someone in the top 5 overall finishers and Mercyhurst Prep had a big 5th behind their top 2 finishers who were both in the top 11 overall. You got to have front running in a loaded meet.
Great running by all these guys! Fantastic way to start the day for the men.
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