What A Weekend: Carlisle Recap

Challenge

There will be a lot of LaSalle team talk (as there should be) after their dramatic win over CR North at the Carlisle Invitational, but how about the result from their #1 runner Evan Addison? Addison clocked a 15:21 on the Carlisle course which puts him #6 all-time in the past 12 seasons. The guys he is behind? Noah and Sam Affolder, (14:47, 15:17), Nate Henderson (14:58), Kyle Dawson (15:17) and Brad Miles (15:20). All of those guys competed at national championships later on that season. To date, Addison has yet to grab an XC state medal, but he’s clearly got the talent for it. This race goes a long way toward backing that up and his front-running presence has clearly inspired the guys around him.

Morgan Cupp of Mechanicsburg was 2^nd in 15:24 and then the CRN duo of Ryan Campbell (15:28) and Ethan Koza (15:33) took 3^rd and 4^th. That’s a blazing top 4 PA runners. All 4 are in the top 16 times on this course the past 12 seasons. Koza’s time matches Brent Kennedy, who went on to be a Footlocker Finalist in his own right.

It’s been a bit of musical chairs for these top 4 runners. Campbell and Koza both defeated Addison at Briarwood before Evan flipped the script at Carlisle. Koza defeated his teammate last weekend, but both runners ended up finishing behind Cupp on both occasions. So you can feel free to tell me how to rank these guys on my XC Top 50 list because I don’t have much of a clue.

I’ll tell you one thing I know for sure, this Brenden Miller is legit. The Upper Dauphin senior ran 15:40 to place 5^th overall in this race. I believe Miller is the only one his team or at least the only one who is at his state-class ability level. Yet the senior has been able to push himself to impressive achievements, including a 3^rd place finish last spring in the state 3200. Miller’s 15:40 puts him in some pretty elite company as Big Spring’s Vinny Todaro is the only AA/A guy to run faster than him in the past 12 seasons. Can Miller perhaps take down the seemingly invincible Tristan Forsythe in A? We know he won’t be afraid to go for it on race day and, thanks to this mark, he’s at least making the discussion interesting.

Also posting a top small school mark was Grove City’s Jonah Powell. Powell was the top junior in the race and continues an impressive season. Powell tops all-time GC great Jacob Kildoo’s personal best on this course with his time of 15:48. The top two sophomores in the race were both under 16 and both belonged to LaSalle. Vincent Twomey and Ethan Maher took 14^th and 16^th in the final standings with sub 16 marks. They were just ahead of the top frosh in the field, Mifflin County’s Brayden Harris. Just a year after we had Carlos Shultz and Dan Mcgoey, Harris looks to be another supremely talented frosh. He clocked 16:20 for 17^th in a loaded field. This kid is a star already.

Let’s jump ahead to the teams. LaSalle picks up an impressive win with 83 points to outlast a full strength CR North squad by 26 points. The Explorers averaged 15:58 (!) and North averaged 16:02. Let’s compare those averages to some recent standout teams.

·         2016 Carlisle (state runner-ups with big time front runner) averaged 15:54 last year for the win. They finished just 10 behinds ahead of DT West who averaged 16:12, speaking to the disparity in spread for Carlisle vs. West.

·         2015 DT West (state and regional champs) averaged 16 flat on this course with 52 points

·         2013 Henderson (back to back state champs and national qualifiers) averaged 16:09 without their best runner (Tony Russell). Give Russell a 15:30 (right next to winner Zach Brehm) and you are conservatively looking at 15:58.

·         2006 National Champs Coatesville averaged 15:55 on this course and scored just 30 points in the final standings

So clearly, these times catch your eye. But for my purposes (trying to speculate on who will win the next time these guys go head to head), I think what was most impressive about LaSalle’s victory was the fact that their top 4 matched up so well with CR North’s. I didn’t think anyone would be able to match North’s top 4 this year, but if they scored this one through 4 it still comes out 48 to 51 in favor of LaSalle. So say what you will about North’s 5^th man being a factor (Matt Mullen, who had a strong day in my opinion, running 16:50), but LaSalle won this one with a good, old fashioned top to bottom performance. Heck, if you swap out LaSalle’s #4 and #6, they still end up eking out a win. They’ve got a #7 under 16:40 on this course!

Now I’m sure the Explorers don’t want to hear this after they just ran train on my predictions (no pun intended), but they did have a big win around this same time last year. LaSalle was the champs at Foundation last September and still ended up just 5^th at states without a single top 50 finisher. This time, I think it’s a bigger stage (they didn’t face Carlisle, CRN or DT West at Foundation last time), but they still have to prove they can show up when they get to Hershey. If they run like they did this weekend, no one will beat them.

It was a big day for the home team in Carlisle. One of my bold predictions was that the top D3 teams would be bunched tightly together, but the Herd thundered home with 186 points. That was well ahead of the next best D3 team (a very strong squad from Twin Valley). Carlisle got a sub 16 mark from leader Jack Wisner and two other sub 16:30 performances by Drew Barefield and Cade Rush. I really like this team’s potential. They have a nice amount of depth, some newcomers who are really running well and a leader in Jack Wisner who has a clutch gene when it comes to the Hershey hills. Twin Valley ran pretty well Saturday, especially Chase Knorr who stepped up with a sub 16:10. They were the clear #2 in D3 and are building a complete top 5 every week.

Lurking out of D3 is Cumberland Valley (261) and Mechanicsburg (272). Both of these programs have been state qualifiers in the past. Andrew Brown had a terrific showing (16:07) and the team put 5 guys in the top 70 and under 17 minutes. They look more complete than many of the squads we saw at Big Spring. Mechanicsburg is led by their big 3. Brendan Knepper is sneaky good behind Cupp as a #2. He broke 16 on this course as a junior and is one of the top 40 or so returners in AAA. He could win a state medal this year. They need to have one more guy step up out of their 4-5-6-7 crew if they want to survive the big D3 championships, but if they do they could sneak into states the same way they did last year.

The AA team battle was hotly contested. I made the bold prediction that York Suburban would win the PA team battle overall, but in the end it was AA rival Grove City who usurped Ys and took the top spot in AA with 232 points vs. their rivals 246. That’s not a huge surprise (I had GC #1 in my most recent team rankings), but it is a big statement for the D10 power. The race was definitely close and that, in large part, was thanks to YS’s top 3 who were all ahead of Grove City’s #2. But the Grove rallied back as they stuck 5 runners in ahead of Suburban’s #4. It’s a compelling match-up between these two programs as their two strengths oscillate. Any way you slice it, the AA state title picture is a lot more crowded at the top than it looked a month ago.

By the way, Henderson took 5^th place overall in this race. A year ago, they were 12^th with a 16:52 average (they didn’t have Downing though, which was big). This year, they averaged 16:33. Spencer Smucker may have finished slightly below his ranking entering the meet, but the kid actually ran his fastest ever time on this course with a 15:54. Smucker never seems to shine on this course, peaking at the end of the year (see his freshman season where he was 24^th at states and top 20 or so at districts after being nowhere near that at Carlisle). Calvin Pash really impressed with a  16:15 after showing some flashes a year ago. Then they came through with 3 other sub 17 guys. The 6 and 7 were about a minute back so that’s something to watch, but man it’s hard to deny that Henderson once again looks poised to punch a ticket to states.

Champions

The top PA man in this race was Juniata sophomore Garrett Baublitz. The small school competitor rolled to another marquee invitational finish with a time of 16:03. He narrowly defeated AAA runner Andrew Foster of Ephrata who ran 16:05 in 4^th overall (two out of staters led the way sub 16). Baublitz was already a household name as a sub 4:20 freshman, but Foster picks up his best performance of the year with a 16:05 and enters the landscape for more casual fans (i.e. not me and the local fans). Foster learned a lot from watching Zach Lefever last season and seems poised for a breakthrough as he enters his junior season (much like Lefever did two years back).

AA Lancaster Mennonite’s big three is still rolling. They dropped a 16:13, 16:21 and 16:29 this week, doubling down on their success at Big Spring. All three could be contenders in the district and perhaps the state for top finishes. They were all ahead of Trinity’s Will Bucher (18^th in 16:30) who I expect to contend for a top 5-10 spot in the district.

How about the Oxford boys? They’ve been getting some buzz and they backed it up on race day. Freshman Gavin Fitzgerald led the way with a blazing 16:17 time and the Oxford big 4 backed him. They scored 198 points to pick up the win against strong teams (including D3 state qualifier Lower Dauphin). They had 4 guys at 16:45 or faster and ended up average 16:49. If they can close the gap to #5 just a bit, Oxford is going to be dangerous. Awesome job by this team and their whole top 5 really handled themselves excellently on this big stage.