Prospect a darkhorse no more
The Prospect boys cross country team isn’t used to being looked at as a darkhorse.
After Saturday, the Knights’ cover might be blown.
Boosted by a second-place finish from Michael Leet, the Knights won the Hoffman Estates Class 3A regional with 48 points at Busse Woods.
Prospect beat out Schaumburg (57) and Buffalo Grove (59) as the top seven teams advanced to next Saturday’s Schaumburg sectional at Busse Woods.
“It feels so good after everyone doubted us at the beginning of the year,” Leet said. “We are starting to win some bigger meets.”
Leet, who is a junior running his first season with the varsity due to past injuries, finished in 15:16 and trailed only Buffalo Grove senior Jereme Atchison (14:58).
While the Knights’ season ended last year with a disappointing sixth-place finish in sectionals, guys like Quentin Schaffer (seventh), Mike Thill (10th), Ethan Koch (14th) and Josh Campos (15th) are out to make sure this season goes differently.
“The guys went out there and executed the plan,” said Prospect coach Mike Stokes. “We really wanted to pack it up and run together. That’s been our strength over the years.”
Atchison led from start to finish to lead the Bison to a third-place finish. Taras Dienko (fifth), Dan Roe (sixth) and Steven Salvano (11th) had strong races, as well.
“Jereme ran the race that he was supposed to run,” said BG coach Jamie Klotz. “He took off and never looked back. The rest of us kind of settled. We didn’t finish as well as we needed to.”
Schaumburg’s duo of Evan Prizy (third) and Tyler Anderson (fourth) seemed content to let Atchison pull away and were more focused on running their own race. The strategy worked as the Saxons edged the Bison by just 2 points.
“We knew Atchison was going to be out there,” Anderson said. “We knew he was going to be fast. We wanted to see what he was going to do. We let him take off and just focused on running our race.”
Juan Barajas and Pat Swiech came in at ninth and 19th, respectively, for Schaumburg.
Conant took fourth, buoyed by Alex Miller’s eighth-place finish, and Tyler Schneider took 12th. Senior Brendan Thielsen finished 16th for seventh place Rolling Meadows.
Loyola regional: Maine West advanced with a sixth-place finish with its top five of Nathan Schiavone, Alex Gasca, Eric Vogel, Mike Picchiotti and Felipe Garcia packed in between 32nd and 40th with an eight-second split.
Elk Grove advanced Alex Mertes (25th) and Joey Kraemer (36th) individually.
St. Ignatius regional: Leyden senior Fabian Cabrera took second on the 3.02-mile Washington Park course in Chicago. The Eagles finished fifth behind juniors Nick Avila (18th) and Rocco DiMatteo (26th) and seniors Deeo Shah (29th) and George Johnson (32nd).
Class 2A
Mather regional: Junior Kevin Schreiber finished fourth in 15:41.9 to lead St. Viator (67) to third place behind Mather (34) and Fenton (57).
Rounding out Viator’s top five were sohpomores Nick Brey (10th, 16:16.75) and Jason Ziolkowski (10th, 16:44.13), junior Will Beiersdorf (17th, 16:44.79) and senior Elliot Hilgert (20th, 16:49.31).