Sturgis girls cross country qualifies for state finals for fourth consecutive season
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The St. Joseph County area will be represented at the MHSAA state cross country finals this weekend.
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The Sturgis girls are headed to the state finals for the fourth consecutive year. A pair of boys' teams will also run at the finals, with Centreville and White Pigeon both qualifying. Several individuals were not on qualifying teams but ran their way to a state finals appearance.
Division 2
The Sturgis girls finished third overall at the regional race held at Portage West Middle School. Portage Central was the host of the regional here, where the Trojans scored 118 points. Otsego won the regional with 29 points, and Plainwell also qualified for the girls with 100 points as the Wolverine Conference teams swept the state-qualifying spots.
Alice Starkey paced the orange and black on the day. She finished 10th overall at the regional round and ran a personal-best time of 19:33 for the day. Lulu Park was 18th overall at 20:12, while Leilani Machuca was 26th at 20:37. Emmy Farber ran to 31st at 20:56; Ally Farber was 33rd with a time of 21:01, followed by Annmarie Taylor in 37th at 21:11. Eleanor Park came in 43rd at 21:36.
Also qualifying for the state finals in Division 2 was David Kore of Three Rivers. He had an impressive day on the course with a fifth-place finishing time of 16:10.
Division 3
The Centreville boys are headed to the state finals as a team. The Bulldogs qualified by finishing third at the regional round with 82 points. Hanover-Horton was first as a team; it posted 48 points, while Jonesville also qualified for the finals by finishing second with 54. The regional was hosted at Ella Sharp Park in Jackson.
The Centreville boys were led by Will Hulin yet again. He placed fourth as an individual with a time of 15:53, finishing just a handful of seconds behind the winner, who was Cooper Flick of Hanover-Horton (15:44).
Centreville also had three additional runners inside the Top 20 for the day. Max Reed ran to 10th place overall at 16:23, while Nick Overweg came in 15th at 16:26 and Will Swanwick was 19th at 16:47. Corban Brueck posted 18:14 for 43rd, Landon Weis was 49th at 18:29 and Tanner Bingaman came in 50th overall at 18:37.
Constantine will be represented by a trio of runners at the finals. Aaron Hofmeister finished 12th overall for the boys with a time of 17:31. The Constantine girls had two qualifiers: Allison Burns ran a time of 20:54 that was good for eighth place overall, while Anna Davidhizar came in 11th place at 21:20.
Bronson will also be sending a representative to the state finals. For the girls, Alonna Goodsell punched her ticket to the finals with a 13th-place finish with a time of 20:33 on the day.
Division 4
The White Pigeon boys are headed to the state finals. The Chiefs ran to third place as a team at the regional hosted at Portage West Middle School with 67 points. Kalamazoo Hackett won the regional with 25 points as a team; Bridgman came in second as a team with 58.
The Chiefs finished with four runners inside the Top 20 individual spots. They were led by Aiden Jackson, who came in 12th overall at 18:26. Zack Wiley finished 14th with a time of 18:50 while William Throw was 16th (18:55) and Isaac Doubblestein finished 19th (19:28). Matthew McGahan (23rd, 19:42), Corey White (28th, 20:08) and Tanner Ritchie (39th, 21:12) also ran for the Chiefs on the day.
For the girls, Aubrey Miller is headed to state as an individual. She finished 18th at the regional round with a time of 23:11.
Colon's Belle Noga is also headed to the state finals as an individual. She placed 16th overall at the regional round, running a time of 22:42.
The Finals
The MHSAA state cross country finals will be run on Saturday, Nov. 7. Michigan International Speedway is once again the host site for the finals for the Lower Peninsula.
Races will take place throughout the day. The Division 4 boys get things started with a 9:30 a.m. race start. The day will conclude with the Division 1 girls running at approximately 3:30 p.m., and there will be a pair of awards presentations — Divisions 3 and 4 will be at 12:15 p.m. while Divisions 1 and 2 are scheduled to have awards ceremonies at 4 p.m.
Contact Sports Editor Brandon Watson at [email protected]. Follow him on X, formerly known as Twitter, @BwatsonSJ.
This article originally appeared on Sturgis Journal: Sturgis girls cross country qualifies for state finals for fourth consecutive season