They Ain't Got No Award For That: Brophys

The biggest surprise of the individual battles came in the final, most exciting race of the day. Jake Brophy dropped the hammer the final 500m, flew down hill, burst up hill and found himself flying to the finish line in a course record (just saying course record doesn't seem to so it justice honestly, he dropped that time into another dimension).

Brophy came into the year among the title hopefuls, but sitting behind some established names in the rankings. Molino, Abert and James had better resumes on the track and in XC. Jaxson Hoey was coming off a killer track season of his own. Hockenbury was a state champ in track with potential to repeat the feat in cross. There wasn't much room for Brophy (a top 10 runner in AAA and the top returner from the D1 championships) to get his talk.

But we were foolishly overlooking him. The sophomore to junior jump is significant, as exhibited by the massive difference in sophomore and junior state medalists and state XC titles. A junior has finished in one of the top 2 spots at states every year since 2011, over that span the top sophomore is Brent Kennedy at 7 (then Brophy at 8).

Plus Brophy was a special sophomore. As a freshman in a very talented year for PA, he broke 16 minutes in the 5k and came within a few seconds of medaling at states, a very rare achievement for a freshman (which admittedly sounds silly considering Spencer Smucker literally just did it, but trust me it's hard).

Then he was a top 10 runner in the state as a soph, another difficult achievement. That put him in a group with recent studs like Brent Kennedy (footlocker finalist, 2nd at states), Brad Miles (district, state and regional champ) and Vince McNally (Footlocker finalist with 15:02/9:05/4:07 PRs). So yeah, it was pretty elite company.

This past indoors I made a bold prediction: that Jake Brophy would win the indoor state title at 3000m. Considering Deluca, James and Martin's resume to that point, it was quite a statement to make about a sophomore. I was expecting a bit slower of a pace and when things got charged up, it wasn't in the cards for Brophy. However, he stuck his nose in it and kicked like a champ to find his way to third (and almost second) in a very impressive performance. Third in the 3k indoors was no joke and finishing just behind Deluca (ran about 9:03 outdoors) and just ahead of James (another 9:03) was a good sign.

Outdoors was setting up to be a fantastic battle in the 32. Russell, Wilson and Martin looked very strong and new guys were breaking 9:20 every week. Off the top of my head Russell, Wilson, Martin, McGoey, Barchet, Deluca, Webb, Kazanjian, Molino, Hockenbury, Marston, Comber, Stratman, Collins, Gebhart, Groh, James, Hoey, Dahl and Reilly all got under last spring. So 18 guys that I can remember. Gotta be some kind of record.

But Brophy wasn't among the guys to do it and so we didn't associate him with all the fancy PRs and the impressive numbers. But that wasn't really fair.

Outdoors, the CB East 4x8 was an up and coming squad. They qualified for the Penn Relays and so too did Jake Brophy in the 3k. The squad decided to give Jake a fresh shot at a big PR in the super competitive invitational 3k and they tried to advance to the championship of America without him.

It ended up being a tough day all around. The CBE 4x8 was in qualifying position through 3 legs, but their 4th just didn't have the gears to bring it home. Then Jake struggled in another absurdly fast race that night and ended up with a disappointing finish at the back of the field.

I won't pretend I know exactly what went into the decision, but I know this: after Penn Relays, Jake Brophy had sacrificed any individual hopes of a 3200m medal to try and help is brothers (some literal some metaphorical) compete for a state title in the 4x8.

And that is where Brophy, a guy likely best suited for the 2 mile/5k, learned to harness his speed. In the state finals, a string of 1:55-56 legs got the stick around to Jake in position to fight with the leaders: Penn Relays champs Henderson and state indoor champs State College.

Against 1:52 man Cather and 1:54 guy Thompson (with 1:54 guy Grace and a slew of 1:51-1:53 guys chasing) Brophy held his own and ran his own 1:55-1:56 type split to bring home a hard fought third for East. The team smashed their own school record in the process.

Maybe then is when we should have known this guy had the total package. He had the strength to be a title contender in a loaded 3k indoors. He had the speed to contend with the best 4x8 anchors in the state. And he had the heart to put aside individual numbers for a chance to do something special as a team.

At some point during this whole process, I imagine someone said something like, "Don't worry Jake, you are just a sophomore. You will have a few more chances at individual state gold."

Funny how some things work themselves out.