REDFIELD – Northwestern’s Ella Boekelheide and Dupree’s Tayshaun Cudmore won individual races during the Redfield Invitational cross country meet on Thursday.
Clark-Willow Lake won the girls’ team crown with Aberdeen Roncalli second. Deuel edged Dupree by one point to win the boys’ team title.
“I was really excited about how the girls ran the race,” said Roncalli coach Casey Steele, “not just effort wise, but strategically to let the race unfold in front of them.”
Tara Blachford of Northwestern was second in the girls’ race with Kamryn Nesheim of Clark-Willow Lake third, Ryelle Gilbert of Groton fourth, and Roncalli’s Addison Cassady rounding out the top five.
“Addison was two seconds off the school record,” Steele said.
Roncalli also received strong performances from seventh graders Taylor McComsey (15th) and Harper Kline (18th).
Steele was curious to see how his young runners would perform.
“I wasn’t sure how they would respond to being in a varsity race, Steele said. “They really did a nice job in that first half mile not going out so stinking fast like young kids have a tendency to do. … They were passing kids throughout the middle of the race to move up into the top 20 slots, so that was great.”
Gavin Hirsch of Herreid-Selby Area was second in the boys’ race, followed in the top five by Jayden Schwan of Groton, Kaden Ober of James Valley Christian, and Spencer Olsen of Dupree.
Aberdeen Christian’s Joseph Richards pulled off a top-25 finish in a time of 18:37.04.
Roncalli’s top finisher was eighth grader Ben Keller who took 44th.
“Ben Keller being an eighth grader runs 19:30,” Steele said, “there’s not many eighth graders that can go out and do that in a varsity race.”
The rest of the Cavaliers were close together farther pack in the back.
“I was really pleased with how they responded,” Steele said. “Every one of the young boys ran PRs for their 5Ks. It’s hard to argue that we could have gotten more out of them.”
Roncalli will compete in the Salmi-Sahli meet at Lee Park Golf Course next Thursday morning.
To see complete meet results, click on the following link:
