Crystal Lake Central dominates Wauconda field by huge margin
There were a lot of strong girls cross country teams and individuals Saturday morning at the 25-team Wauconda Invitational.
The high temperatures made conditions somewhat difficult to navigate the 3.05-mile Lakewood Forest Preserve course, but Crystal Lake Central proved to be the class of the big field as the Tigers easily outdistanced runner-up Kaneland by a 64-103 margin.
Third-place Glenbard East (130 points) was led by individual champion Lindsey Rakosnik, who dominated the rest of the runners with a winning time of 17:40.
Cary-Grove took home fourth place with 168 points, while Huntley nipped Lakes 196-197 for fifth place. Warren (208) placed seventh to topple North Suburban Conference rival Mundelein (223) in eighth.
“I think the girls are starting to run with a lot of confidence and our 5-6-7 runners really stepped it up today,” said Cary-Grove coach Mark Anderson. “Sarah Englund had her best race of the season today in 15th place and everybody else fell in line behind her.”
Eleventh-place Stevenson (323) was once again led by freshman standout Kya Suzuki, who placed fourth with a 19:02 clocking.
“I think everybody ran a great race. They did a great job, and I’m just happy to have tough competition so I can get better next year,” said Suzuki, who won the Lake County meet on the same course to open the season. “We really pushed ourselves hard, and it was great experience running against all of the different teams.”
Stevenson coach Don Proft is very happy with the dramatic improvement Suzuki has already shown this season.
“She ran a very strong race and her time was 33 seconds faster than the Lake County meet two weeks ago, so that is a great time improvement in a short amount of time,” Proft said. “Lily Walker really stepped up as our No. 3 runner today, and she really had a strong last two miles of the race.”
Lakes’ drive to sixth place was led by the duo of Hannah Wittman in fifth and Kathryn Dean in eighth.
“We did not have our full squad on varsity today, but they fought their way into the lead pack after having a really slow start,” said Lakes coach Keith West, whose team moved three runners down to the frosh-soph meet. “Then they held on and they finished strong, even though we didn’t have our full varsity.”
Warren was paced by the tandem of Meg Tully in 19th and Andrea Saigh in 23rd. Melissa Perreault led Mundelein’s surge in 12th place.
Lake Zurich was another squad not at full strength due to the ACT Saturday. But Elizabeth Berton turned in a solid 20th-place finish for the Bears.
“We were missing a few girls because of the ACT, but their times were good today,” said Lake Zurich coach Ian Silverman. “We ran three of our six experienced varsity kids today, and I thought Elizabeth Berton looked great in 20th place.”
Huntley was led by Kelly Meehleib in seventh place. Kathie Wollney added a 22nd-place run for Cary-Grove. Huntley’s pack was bolstered by Amy Kahl (27th), Beth Parks (32nd) and Delaney Loprieno (34th).