Lake Zurich reclaims NSC boys cross country title

After taking second place to Vernon Hills last year, the Lake Zurich boys cross country team returned to the league mountain top Saturday afternoon at the North Suburban Conference meet in Lake Forest.

The Bears outdistanced the runner-up Cougars this time around as Lake Zurich captured the championship of the 13-team meet with 43 points, well ahead of VH's 96, in the 3-mile race on the grounds of the west campus.

The race for second through fourth places was very close with Stevenson (109 points) edging Warren (112) for third place.

With another first-place finish, the Bears have built a mini-dynasty with Saturday's crown marking the sixth time in seven years Lake Zurich has captured the title.

The road to that championship was paved by standout sophomore Matt Pereira, who overcame a late deficit to Stevenson senior Sam Oh (14:47) as Pereira would win the race by three seconds with start-time temperatures at 46 degrees.

Pereira led for the better part of the race on the damp grounds before Oh gained first-place briefly with about 200 meters to go. But after taking second place in the NSC last year, Pereira refused to be denied top honors Saturday with a great surge down the final stretch carrying him to victory.

“I gave it everything I had, I was able to find the strength to excel with one more burst, and he (Oh) really pushed me,” said Pereira, who placed 69th in Class 3A as a freshman. “We've got pretty high goals this season and we're pretty confident about sectionals. We just have to keep the pack close.”

The Bears' pack was more than close enough for the crown with freshman Patrick Burns in eighth, sophomore Brian Griffith in ninth, sophomore Kyle Griffith in 11th, and senior Justin Shim rounding out their top-five scoring in 14th.

Lake Zurich's depth really shined through in the big meet with both Mark Spatz (20th), and Ryan Obsuszt (29th) making the (top 30) all-conference team.

“They're really doing a nice job of kind of running together and holding their pack so we had a great race today,” said Lake Zurich coach J.B. Hanson. “Sam Oh gave Matt everything he could handle, and Matt, to his credit, was able to copy his move and get him at the end.”

Vernon Hills' squad put together a strong effort with sophomore Shane Williamson (14:54) looking very impressive in third place.

Warren senior Dustin Macuiba placed fifth in 15:10 while Stevenson's Jared Borowsky (15:12) placed fifth on a day when a ton of runners had personal best times.

After Williams, the Cougars' pack was bolstered by Tyler Smith in 10th, Trevor Moyers in 22nd, and Rob Williams in 26th.

“I'm happy, we wanted to focus on running as a pack and I think we probably ran our second best team race of the year today,” said Vernon Hills coach Mark Whitney, who pointed to an early September meet in Peoria as their No. 1 team race. “We had a couple of guys coming back from minor injuries who all ran well today so I'm pretty optimistic heading into the state series and I felt good about the meet.”

Besides the great leadership the Patriots got from Oh and Borowsky, sophomore teammate Paul Udoni also made all-conference in 18th place.

“Most of our top seven ran season-best times today and the body of work is starting to kind of come together,” said Stevenson coach Scott Sommers. “He (Oh) ran a great race, he ran a great time, and Jared was right there with this best time today.”

After Macuiba's fourth, the short-handed Blue Devils got a 15th from Jakob Martinez, and a 16th from Jaime Delgado.

“We ran OK considering two of our top six runners were out today,” said Warren coach Bill Dawson. “The people that were here ran well, we just have to get healthy in the next two weeks.”

Fifth-place Liberytville (150) was led by the youthful duo of sophomore Stephen Richardson (16th), and freshman Alex Tam (21st).

“This is the first time he (Richardson) finished first on the team, and they ran better than expected,” said Libertyville coach Mark Buesing. “It's not a fast course and we ran PR's, so you can't ask for much more than that.”

Grant's senior tandem of Frank Cardy (12th) and Jeffrey Brundidge (13th) were very solid while Antioch senior Dan Ressler continued to shine in 19th.

Mundelein was paced by MIckey Cardenas in 27th with teammate Chris Palacios capturing the final all-conference spot in 30th.

The Mustangs' Ben Krauss (31st), Round Lake teammates Carlos Rosas (32nd), and Andrew Maskevich just missed the all-NSC cut-off.