State College: 0 to 800 Real Quick

Last May the men of State College captured the outdoor state championship in the 4x800m. The time of 7:41.99 broke a long standing school record and helped SC defend their indoor gold from earlier in the year. The relay was made up entirely of Seniors and was anchored by three-time individual state medalist Will Cather. Although State College had a couple of 7th place finishes in previous years, 2014 was a huge breakthrough from Cross Country all the way to Track. By the time June had ended, Chris Golembeski, Kyle Adams, Mason Post and Will Cather had finished a long journey to the top of the state and it appeared an era had ended for the program.

But don't tell this year's State College team their time is done. Despite losing their entire state championship squad, the Lions (not actually sure if this is their team name, but I'm just going to go with it) have come storming back to the top of the state in 2015 behind their next wave of talented runners. After performing valiantly in the alternate role, Junior Alex Milligan (4:27 and 1:59 already this winter) has taken over the top position and excelled. In Cross Country he placed higher than Cather did the previous season, grabbing 16th place overall.

It was a testament to State College's tremendous depth in 2014, that Milligan was not on the varsity squad but still qualified individually for both the indoor and outdoor state championships in the 1600m. That's an incredibly rare achievement. Meanwhile, State College was quietly running "B" squads that were beating most teams "A" teams, but, because names are rarely listed on relays, no one could tell the difference. A slew of runners were gaining experience in important races and, perhaps more importantly, training with four state championship caliber athletes.

In 2015, State College got the chance to see the benefits of that incredible depth. This year's team has already produced 6 sub 2:08 runners including three runners (Milligan, Tony Degleris, and Nick Feffer who are in the top 50 or so of the event). The 4th member of the relay, Eric Heatwole, clocked a 4:39.90 in the same meet as his season best of 2:05.5. Together, these four runners combined to run 8:05.64 at the Kevin Dare Invitational, earning gold medal honors and a #2 time in the state behind Pennsbury (who ran 7:57 this weekend at the Armory).

The 4x8 relay is typically one of the most difficult title defenses at either state meet. Bensalem won the state titles in 2013, but finished just 9th indoors before missing the finals outdoors. In fact you would have to go back to 2007-2008 to find a successful title defense: North Penn won back to back titles both indoors and out. That was at the end of a dynasty period for the Knights and in 2008 they returned all four members of their championship squad from 2007. State College is returning 0.

There have been some close calls repeat wise in recent years besides North Penn. In 2013, Cumberland Valley finished a hard fought 2nd to Bensalem in their title defense efforts. In 2011, defending champions Abington set a state record during the regular season and won a national championship indoors. However, they lost the state meet to a legendary run by Central Bucks West (who broke Abington's state record in the process). But again Abington and CV each returned three members from their championship team.

Ironically that Central Bucks West team may be closest to State College on paper. CB West lost all four members of their indoor state championship team to graduation in 2011, but in 2012 the CB West team battled back to a sub 8 time and found itself on the medal stand again in one of the deeper fields in state history. The key may have been Nico Metzler, the alternate for the relay the year before. He filled in for one of the injured Seniors, learned and contributed to an outdoor state title team and, with gold around his neck, had the confidence to put together an excellent 2012. He ran a great anchor leg on the indoor relay and was an individual medalist in the 1600m during outdoors.

But State College isn't just looking to mix it up and surprise for a medal this indoors. They want to go back to back on their home track in front of their home fans. There is no rebuilding window for SC, there is simply a reloading window.

And the first shots have been fired.