A Rivalry Renewed

Back in the day when I was still a consistent, knowledgeable poster on the matters of high school track and field in the great state of Pennsylvania, the greatest debate in my entire era was without a doubt the Henderson and Ohara cross country debate. There were stunningly passionate debates that sprung forth without fail on my blog leading to an 100+ comment post back in the day.

Things are not yet at that level, but as we approach the new balance national meet this weekend the headlining event for PA track fans has to be the DMR where Henderson and Ohara will go head to head to once again renew their rivalry. I will now attempt to dissect this race but there are so many levels to the complexity of this debate to is hard to say with any certainty what we will witness up in NYC.

The History
When did this rivalry really begin? Well things probably go back to the 2012 XC season where the boys from O'Hara were coming off a heartbreak at the state championships and the boys of Henderson were coming off perhaps an even more disappointing 5th place finish at states. O'Hara was "not a clutch team" and lacked the big name fire power. Henderson was "inexperienced" and "couldn't run the state course".

Well all that turned out to be a load of crap. O'Hara and Henderson had two of the most fantastic performances in the history of the meet, each scoring well under 100 points and putting their top 5 in the top 50 overall (and I mean overall not any of that team scoring crap). Both squads at 3 state medalists, but Henderson pulled it out on an improbable 6th man tie-breaker. Henderson's 6th man even finished in the top 50 of the race overall. Wow. It lived up to all the hype really.

Then there was the post states craziness that included two teams punching their tickets to nationals, a 1-2 finish by the Henderson boys at regionals, a surprise all-american performance from Reiny Barchet and a top 5 finish by the O'Hara squad in some extremely sloppy conditions out in Oregon.

Indoors we saw an epic 4xMile rematch for these two teams with Henderson ultimately beating out a somewhat tired O'Hara squad who was doubling a few key legs from the DMR the night before. Tony Russell had a huge anchor leg and both teams ended up with top all time indoor marks for the 4xMile including #1 and #2 in PA state history I believe.

Outdoors, O'Hara once again got their revenge, beating Henderson's DMR squad behind an impressive run at the Penn Relays that featured some big PRs for Belfatto and James. This DMR at Penn was the last time the squads raced this particular event against each other at full strength. O'Hara ran a 10:06 with Henderson running 10:13.

In cross country in 2013, it was Henderson's year. They wiped the floor with the competition and O'Hara had to sit back and settle for a well-earned, arguably somewhat surprising, 3rd place finish the year after they lost 3 of their top 4 runners. All indoors Henderson took control of the headlines behind a brilliant series of miles by Tony Russell and some very strong DMRs.

Then, all of a sudden, O'Hara got their name back in the discussion. They started with a dominating DMR at meet of champs. They followed that with a 4:17, 1:54, 8:42 and then a second place finish in the 4x8. Despite that Henderson dominated the field in the men's DMR, O'Hara had still made an impressive statement. There would be a race at NBIN, and O'Hara would be hungry to win this next chapter in the saga.

O'Hara's Team
O'Hara lost Dan Savage, their solid anchor leg from a year ago, and will replace his production by adding Nick Smart to the relay (11th at states in XC, 1:54 at indoor states). Smart is almost definitely locked in for 800m with James and Belfatto having superior mile credentials on their resume and he will be likely on of the best 800m legs in the entire field which is encouraging. But what will the squad choose to do at the book ends? It remains a bit of a mystery.

According to the official entries O'Hara listed their team in the following order: Belfatto, James, Smart, McCullough, Cooper. To me that says, they will run James to McCullough to Smart to Belfatto but that is far from set in stone. I would be foolish to read too much into the order they were listed in the entries.

That being said, I think there are many advantages to this order. James has proven in the past he can be a gusty lead off leg. Last year at Penn he ran an incredibly impressive race and split 3:04.4, running faster than 1:51 man Andrew Stone of Champion LaSalle. That takes some balls. James is lacking a little bit of extra strength because got a late start on indoors thanks to his national qualifying mark at NXNE. Belfatto just ran a sick mile at states and has the confidence and Senior leadership to bring it home on the anchor. So this order makes sense.

That being said, Belfatto certainly has more speed than James as a 1:54ish guy right now and could probably drop something amazing on the 1200m leg if he is ready for the challenge (I think he ran the 12 leg on their DMR at meet of champs but I don't remember). That would set the team up with the leaders, possibly in the lead with a cushion, by the time James gets the baton and he can use his gutsyness to get them to the line first (I'm sorry I have a natural bias towards Kevin James because he wanted me to sign his face, so you are going to have to bare with me on this).

O'Hara has some very nice pieces here and is, in my opinion, a much better DMR team than 4x8 team. They have no clear weaknesses on this relay.

Henderson's Team
The Henderson squad is listed as follows: Moy, Thompson, Stratman, Russell, Collins. That says to me that the order is going to be Moy, Thompson, Stratman, Russell, a very logical order to me. Russell is fantastic on the 1200m leg this year and last, but Moy has proven he can handle the load just fine and getting a guy like Russell on chase duty is money in the bank.

Henderson's strength is certainly Russell. Tony Russell was good last year indoors and outdoors, but he was never even close to being this good. Russell has already notched a slew of times faster than his best marks from a year ago with something like 5 times of 4:11 or faster equivalent for 1600m. That's straight moving. With Russell on the anchor, O'Hara is going to need to have a lead, and likely a big lead, to stay out of danger. Tony, who has had to lead just about every track race of his entire life through all the hard parts, will be grateful to be able to have people to chase and drag him around to a fast mark. Could be something epic.

But we shouldn't overlook the rest of this squad either, they are no slouches and are all state champions in cross and the DMR now. Moy developed into a stud last year outdoors when he dropped 1:55 and 4:16 type marks with big kicks. He still has that strong kick and solid wheels and those translate very nicely to a 1200m leg. Moy struggled a bit at indoor states in the open mile, but he and Thompson really made that race easy for Henderson with their middle two legs (both guys on the double as well). I think the mile indoors is a tough race for a 8-15 type like Moy to excel at just because of all the laps. Mentally it just isn't as easy. The 1200m is going to be right around his sweet spot indoors and really, Moy has the potential to be faster than either 1200m leg that O'Hara trots out.

Stratman took a big step last week anchoring that DMR. He was very poised with his front running and soloed one of Henderson's best marks of the day. That's how he made this an easy decision for Coach Kelly on the DMR. Stratman is the big wild card. I could see him being as fast as 1:56 high or as slow as 2:01ish if he has an off day, but I think it is much more likely we see something on the quicker side. These Henderson guys have given us very few data points (with the exception of Russell who has done a decent amount of racing) so projecting their current fitness at events they haven't often run will be tricky. If Stratman looks like he did at indoor states, he will have a big day that Henderson desperately needs.

The other thing that can't be overlooked here is what Thompson brings on the 400m leg. Henderson goes from something like a 58ish on their first DMR of the season to having a bonafide 51. leg with the potential to run 50. on fresh legs. He is certainly an X-factor in this race and suddenly gives Henderson one of the better 4 legs in the field.

The Race
It will be tight at the beginning no doubt between these two squads. I think James is gutsy enough to hang around with Moy even if Moy might have superior finishing speed. I go back and forth on who has the edge in this one, but I think I've changed my mind and I say a slight, slight edge to O'Hara on this leg. If Belfatto runs it's an even better advantage for O'Hara in my mind because Belfatto has been very impressively lately.

The 400 legs are usually a push, but Thompson's development probably gives Henderson a bit of an edge at this point.

At 800m it's Smart with a big advantage. Stratman needs to fight and keep it close for Russell and I think he will do that.

On the anchor Russell has a big advantage. If he is healthy and mentally in it he is basically a lock for 4:11 or faster. I am a big Belfatto fan, but I can't see him popping off anything under 4:14, and 4:14 would really be something big. So Henderson probably is looking at a 4-5 second advantage here if both guys have great days. That may ultimately end up being the difference.

My prediction ....
Henderson 10:09.11
O'Hara 10:10.39

That's my guess, let me know what you think!