Business as Usual: Some More Recaps

by Jarrett Felix

As usual there was more than one meet this weekend and, as usual, I have put most of my recapping energies into one meet so (as usual) I will be making a second post to try and cover the other meets you may have missed. 

So let's proceed as usual.

At the Pittsburgh Central Catholic Invitational, Nick Wolk continued a near perfect season with another victory, beating the duo of Kalapos and Harris for Mt Lebo (a team he has faced in basically every race this season). Although the margin between Wolk and his WPIAL competitors was a bit closer than usual, I'm not reading too much into it. That being said, he will have to keep his competitive fire high going into districts as I'd imagine the NA boys will be coming after him individually on their favorite stage. 

Strong run by Noah Beveridge, the promising Butler sophomore, who returned to the tops of the WPIAL scene with a 6th place finish. Gotta like the running from Allerdice's Diallo and Davis this season. It's some of the best running we've seen from D8 since DiSilvio medaled at states a few years back.

Even without Foundation front runner Todd Gunzenhuaser, Lebo was able to capture the team title, although it was close between themselves and Pittsburgh Central Catholic (the home team) who had its own very solid pack that nearly was enough to pull the upset. Pitts CC wasn't a big factor in the front loaded Carlisle race, but things changed quickly for them this weekend with a return to WPIAL action. I'm still very shaky on who the front runners are out of D7 and I think that the qualifying spots will depend more on packs than anything else at Coopers later this month. That's good news for Pitts CC.

At McQuaid, it looks like Isaac Wilson was PA's top dog, beating out Noah Curtin of Mercyhurst Prep for the honors. Wilson has had a very nice season, impressing in his few major invites like Pre States last week. Noah Curtin was a top 15 man in A last year for Mercyhurst and likely learned a few things from his little brother Sebastian. Sebastian is a sub 16 at Hershey type talent (i.e. a very rare talent) and if Noah can get in the vicinity of that level of performance (and early signs are by the time he graduates, he might) the division should be on look out. Crawley and Curtin were both very intriguing performers this weekend, helping head the Junior class.

At Grove City, Domenic Peretta got a solid win over the home squad's pack, seemingly running relatively unpushed in just his second race of the year. Dom might be the best pure talent in the field for A with 4:10/1:51 chops, however, XC races aren't usually won off speed, but rather strength. Can he beat Mackey in Mackey's comfort zone at Hershey? Unfortunately, this race doesn't tell us much about that question, however, it does encourage me to see DP healthy, racing and winning. 

For Grove City, the pack continues to look good, but we saw at Pre States York Suburban is not going to fold to merely a tight spread. Awesome running from frosh Jonah Powell to lead the way, but can he pull some of his teammates along with him? Grove City is made up almost entirely of returners so every experience this season is important not just for this season but also for next year.

The Northeast Invitational had one of the most underrated performances of the day. Sophomore Isaac Davis from District 4 Jersey Shore unleashed a 16:31 to win by 41 seconds over Quincy Amabile, a man who has spent time in and around the top 50 rankings this year, most notably getting 2nd in the AA race at Big Spring ahead of names like Mears and Signor. Franklin Cunnigham, another strong soph from Hazleton, earned 3rd place honors. Just saying, remember the name Isaac Davis.

Lewisburg, without Bach, pulled out top AA honors behind AAA Hazleton and well ahead of district rivals Mifflinburg. D11's contenders, North Schuylkill slipped in for 3rd. Nice recap of the action on milesplit by Barbara Krohn.

Plot twist! We are back at Pitts CC! This time to talk about the Varsity B race. Did I separate these on purpose to keep my readers on their toes? Or did I just forget about this second race initially and get lazy about scrolling back up the page? You be the judge.

Anyway, Beaver Area made a big statement at this meet, just a week after a difficult showing at Foundation against district rival Knoch, the Beaver boys took 2-3-4-5 to earn team gold in the meet with less than 30 points. Sean Rendar continues to lead the squad as Lamison and the Pittners round out the top 4. Meanwhile A squad Avonworth took another step forward in the competitive WPIAL qualifying race, taking 2nd overall and riding a solid pack behind Michael Noethiger, who finished 8th.

Out in Delaware on the very difficult Salesianum lay out PA split itself up in 3 separate varsity races. In the small school race, Joe Previdi posted fastest PA time of the day with his 16:56 gold, about a 51 second margin of victory. That's particularly impressive considering he just ran a very difficult Hershey course last week. Wissahickon's Lukas Marcelis won the large school section in 16:57, beating an established WPIAL contender in Casey Conboy. Penncrest sophomore Avery Lederer continued his hot streak with a 3rd place finish. Marcelis has quietly had a phenomenal start to the year and likely will be dominating his league championship meet in the coming weeks. He's a sleeper pick for a state medal.

Finally, in the championship section, Carlisle topped North Penn in the team standings, led by the huge 17:04 run from Matt Wisner. Wisner may be a speedster (1:53 800 PR) but he also has really proven himself on hills. He took 14th or so at D3 last year at Hershey in addition to this impressive run in Delaware.

Charlie Scales of the Haverford School got an impressive win at Westtown this weekend in 16:38. This was a nice build off his Briarwood run in the D2 race and sets him well for a top finish in the independent individual race. DT East won the team title with their 27 second spread. Their spread has been dynamite this year and could help them in some of the bigger meets, especially if their top guys have a big day to drag the others along.