It's time to get fired up for cross country! Our traditional XC countdown is back, although it may look a little different this time around - our longtime data analyst Jeff George has moved on, leaving this energizing project to the MileSplit team in CA. Our collective goal is to briefly highlight 30 boys and 30 girls teams that we think will have an impact this fall. We will spotlight one team per gender per day over a 30-day period. Similar to past countdowns, we will provide a cross-sampling of teams from all 10 sections without regard to statewide or even division ranking (those will come later, as will articles previewing each section, and returning athletes to watch). As always, if you catch an error or have updated information for us, email CA state editor Jeffrey Parenti (jeffrey.parenti@flosports.tv) and we'll make the corrections.
St. Francis (SJ/Division-II)
The Troubies placed second in the Sac-Joaquin Section and eighth at the State Meet last fall but graduated key program mainstays including Tatiana Cornejo and Cate Joaquin.
But the drop-off shouldn't been too severe, if at all, with a handful of seemingly interchangeable returners with SJS and State Meet experience.
Veteran coach Chad Worthen takes over the traditionally strong program, inheriting an expected returning lineup that includes five experienced runners. He had previously coached in the Sacramento area at Oak Ridge and Inderkum. Worthen's hire was announced in early August.
The Troubies returning group includes Kelsey Sutch who ran No. 3 at State and No. 4 at SJS, Grace Dunham, who ran No. 5 at State and SJS, Daphne Witherell (No. 4 at State; No. 6 at SJS), Kayla Towne (No. 7 at SJS), and Ryann Strawn No. 6 at State.
| St. Francis (SJ) | ||||
| 1) Grace Dunham | 18:51.30 | 16 | ||
| 2) Daphne Witherell | 18:58.00 | 18 | ||
| 3) Kelsey Sutch | 19:00.30 | 21 | ||
| 4) Kayla Towne | 19:05.10 | 28 | ||
| 5) Ryann Strawn | 19:13.30 | 33 | ||
| Average Time: 19:01.60 Total Time: 1:35:08.00 1-5 Split: 22.00 | ||||
| 6) Paige Quigley | 20:17.00 | 66 | ||
| 7) Chloe Rhodes-Nguyen | 21:08.80 | 101 | ||
Scoring is against all returning SJS girls teams
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Photos by James Leash