By Fred Kroner
St. Joseph Middle School ran away with team honors on Saturday (Oct. 8), capturing team honors in the 17-school Class 2A girls’ IESA sectional cross-country meet on the Panthers’ home course.
St. Joseph ended with a composite score of 47 points. Runner-up El Paso/Gridley had 73 points and third-place Unity finished with 74 points.
Individually, the Panthers’ five scoring runners entered the finish chute within 37.3 seconds of one another.
Seventh-grader Tessa Walker took third place with a 2-mile time of 12 minutes, 48.9 seconds. Sixth-grader Ava Overstreet was the next St. Joseph finisher, ending sixth in 13:07.6.
Following Walker and Overstreet were sixth-grader Mia Miller (12th in 13:12.7), seventh-grader Avarie Dietiker (13th in 13:16.3), sixth-grader Tabby Brown (16th in 13:26.2), seventh-grader Ava Gallo (20th in 3:35.7) and eighth-grader Faith Jackson (28th in 14:02.4).
There were 95 participants in the girls’ sectional race.
The entire St. Joseph girls’ team qualified for state and will race on Saturday (Oct. 15) at 12:30 p.m. at Maxwell Park in Normal.
Two St. Joseph boys also earned berths at state, eighth-grader Colin Burnett and seventh-grader Patrick Clark.
In a sectional race with 104 runners, Burnett wound up in eighth place with a 2-mile time of 11:57.6. Clark was 16th in 12:27.9.
The Panthers’ other sectional competitors were eighth-grader Zach Benoit (31st in 12:57.6), seventh-grader Sam Zadeh (35th in 13:01.5), seventh-grader Eli Franklin (45th in 13:21.1), sixth-grader Adam Bello (57th in 13:43.1) and fifth-grader Camden Fisher (66th in 14:15.1).
Boys’ state-qualifiers Burnett and Clark will run at state on Saturday (Oct. 15) at 1:15 p.m. at Maxwell Park in Normal.
