Back to Back Like I'm Jordan '96, '97

By Jarrett Felix

Oh man. Oh man, oh man. Not again. 

This for y'all that think that I don't write enough

The Ches-mont league has some of the richest cross country history in Pennsylvania. There is, of course, West Chester Henderson who was won state titles in 2009, 2012 and 2013. But there is also 2006 state and national champs Coatesville, 2005 surprise champs West Chester East and now 2015 state and regional champions Downingtown West.

West has quietly won the Ches-mont championships two years in a row (this past year without any seniors). They dominated the state landscape this past year, but before that they were 4th in 2014 and top 10 in 2012. If you combine their district scores from the past four seasons and compare it to the rest of D1, West is #3 out of the stacked group behind only Henderson and Council Rock North. Those teams are clearly their own top tier. West has 890 combined points vs. North’s 770 and Henderson’s 513. Behind them, Pennsbury is #4 at 1,239 and the Central Bucks schools are 1,300+ and 1,400+ at #5 and #6.

Can't fool the city man, they know what's up

But West hasn't had quite long enough a stretch of excellence to earn the unequivocal respect of Henderson or North, who are written in pen on the state qualifier lists every August. In Year 5, West has a chance to make a huge statement about their program. They've come into this season ranked about 8th on average (although our own Blake Behney has them higher). With the graduation of consistent leader Henry Sappey and the graduation/transfer of the prolific Hoey brothers, West has lost their top 3 from a season ago and went from logical pick for back to back champions to relative afterthought in a wild and intriguing preseason team title race (which, for the record, does not in any way affect your actual finish at the state championships). 

I don't blame people for shifting their focus away from West. Carlisle is a super interesting team. CR North is an unbelievably consistent program who hasn't earn team medals in over a decade. LaSalle could be the PCL's first XC state champ. And North Allegheny, no matter what you do, will just never die! All that is much more exciting to me than "DT West has some pretty consistent dudes returning, unique experience and a nice crop of JV talent". But sometimes that boring crap wins championships!

I was puttin on a show, it was a sell out event

Let's take a quick look back at the last couple defending champions finish at states one year removed from their gold medal:

2005 Champ - 4th 2006

2006 Champ - 2nd 2007

2007 - 1st

2008 - 9th (2nd at districts)

2009 - 2nd

2010 - 3rd

2011 - DNQ

2012 - 1st

2013 - 8th (2nd at districts)

2014 - 2nd

So note this is a 10 year sample size (fairly legit sample size I'd say). We are talking about top 4 teams 70% of the time. In the 3 cases where the defending champs didn't place top 4, I've got good excuses. The 2008 state champs, North Penn were also the 2007 state champs. The 2012 and 2013 champs were both Henderson. The third year of each of their dynasty periods was the one they finished outside the top 4, not the 2nd. It's really hard to have a dominate 3 year run (unless you're NA and you are the hydra of cross country) because you have to start stretching into 3 or 4 classes of high schoolers. Also consider the fact that most teams don't win the state championship right away without a buildup period and we are talking about a 4 or 5 year stretch you are trying to own. 

West is not a back to back champ like Henderson or NP heading into this season, so I'm gonna ignore those 2014 and 2009 defending champ finishes (I know, very convenient, but work with me).

The big outlier, of course, is the 2011 North Penn squad. This is easily the biggest upset of the decade (no offense, if anything I think it's a compliment). It's kinda a fluke that they won that title and the district champs who placed nearby were 2nd, 4th and 1st the next year. Just in general, I don't put a ton of stock in 2011 for predictions. Something was in the water that day.

What I'm trying to say (in a really, really long way) is if DT West finishes outside the top 5 at states this year it would be relatively unprecedented given the last decade or so of results. So ranking them as a borderline top 10 seems like an undervalue.

Of course on the flip, I already have an excuse in my back pocket for why things may not work out. When have the defending champs ever lost their super talented sophomore to a transfer? I’d imagine that could throw a wrench into my formulas quite quickly.

But I think that's what makes this season even more critical for the growing legacy around the DT West program. If they can place in the top 2 or 3 this season after losing 4 of their top 5, they have to earn an elite place in history. If they can put together a legitimate run at a repeat state title then I think they earn a spot next to Henderson and CR North among the elite programs in Pennsylvania's infamous district one.

Very important and very pretentious

When I look back I might be mad that I gave this attention

By the way, here's a list of recent teams with streaks of 3 or more years in the top 5:

Coatesville (2004-2007)

Henderson (2009-2013)

O'Hara (2010-2014)

North Allegheny (2006-Present)

Please, think before you come for the great one, please

So how will West do it? The good news is one of their top returners, Ryan Barton, was 36^th at states as a sophomore in 2014 but didn’t run for the varsity squad in Hershey. Given his resume over the past two seasons, he had the potential to be in the top 50 at states in 2015 if he had run and that would give West two Top 50 returners (for those of you keeping score at home, by my count no team currently has two guys coming back who were in the AAA top 50 at states in 2015 although Lower Dauphin has 33 and 51 and Carlisle has two guys who probably would have been there had they not been running in a different state). They also bring back Drew Alansky, Shaun Bullock and Patrick Blair who, at one point or another, ran on the varsity squad a year ago in some extremely important meets.

They bring back 4 sub 4:40 guys (Barton, Bullock, O’Neill and rising junior Evan Kaiser), they bring back 7 sub 10:20 guys (Bullock, Alansky, O’Neill, Blair, rising soph Payton Sewall, rising senior Ben Codd and Kaiser) and for added fun they bring back 6 guys who ran under 2:05 for 800 (can Chase Semanyk make a leap in XC?).

The biggest test for West will likely be the District One Championships. They’ve had a few struggles there in the past (at least relatively to the state championship course) and there’s not exactly a big margin for error this upcoming season as D1 is loaded (we’ve seen CR North, Henderson, Spring Ford, North Penn, CB West, CB East and Bishop Shanahan all listed as projected state qualifiers in a lot of places and that’s not even counting whoever this year’s breakout sleepers are).

I love the way this team runs the state course and, if they make it, I think they will surprise some people who counted them out after the graduations/transfers happened. That said making it out of District One is going to be wild. But hey, the elite programs, they find a way, year after year, to get it done. And, perhaps, that is exactly what DT West is. 

They want it back to back