HURON – The boys’ cross country banner will need some alteration at Golden Eagles Arena after Aberdeen Central won the Eastern South Dakota Conference championship on Saturday at Broadland Creek Golf Course in Huron.

The Golden Eagles won their sixth ESD title in the past nine years, finishing in front of Brookings and Brandon Valley.

“We knew it was going to be really tight between Brandon Valley and Brookings and us,” said Central coach Greg Murley. “It turned out to be that way.”

Central had five of the top 17 runners on the way to securing the title.

“We had some kids come along and improve their times for the year, and it was good to see,” Murley said.

The Golden Eagles finished with 51 points, eight better than Brookings.

“We knew it was going to be tight; 51 points is a pretty low score in the ESD meet, especially when you’re looking at three teams kind of fighting for it,” Murley said. “I actually thought 60 points would probably win it, so we ran even a little bit better than I thought.”

Carson Urlacher led Central with a fourth-place finish in a time of 15:58.59, just two spots ahead of teammate Tate DeVries at 16:13.46. Max Nelson was 11th, Esten Foss 13th, and Patrick Severson 17th.

Murley noted that some runners had personal records, which is difficult to do at Huron compared to say Yankton Trail Park in Sioux Falls.

“Huron is a pretty hilly course. Yankton Trail has no hills, no obstacles on it,” Murley said. “There’s probably a 15-20 second difference in courses.”

In the end, it turned out to be another banner day for the Golden Eagles.

“I’m very happy with our guys,” Murley said. “Our 1-6 guys really competed hard. Our 7-8-9 guys got a lot better. They’re improving.”

The Central girls also had a strong meet, finishing fifth in the team standings.

“ESD is one of those meets we’ve been prepping for this season and we had a great day to perform today,” said Central girls’ coach Eric Pedersen. “As a team, we talked about continuing to work together to make small gains as far as some of our goals are concerned, which will result in an improved team performance.”

Central was led by Juna Ramey, who finished 11th in a time of 19:22.09.

“Juna was All-ESD again, which was really cool for her to get back to that point,” Pedersen said, “as that’s been one of her goals again this season.”

Allie Novstrup finished 18th in a time of 19:48.24, Kylee Hanley was 32nd, and Iris Ramey took 40th.

Pedersen was pleased with how the Golden Eagles competed in one of their biggest meets of the season.

“I’ve been happy with how the girls have taken some of those improvements into consideration and stayed patient and used the confidence to get themselves better each week,” Pedersen said.

Central will compete in the Roger Loecker Invitational back in Huron on Thursday before heading to the state meet Oct. 26 in Rapid City.

To see complete ESD results, click on the following link:

https://www.athletic.net/CrossCountry/meet/241006/results/all