Naughton, Johnson go 1-2 to pace Mundelein’s title run
Mundelein featured an impressive — and victorious — 1-2 punch Saturday.
Mustangs junior Claire Naughton was the individual champion with a winning time of 18:51.45, outdistancing runner-up teammate Steph Johnson (19:04) on the 3-mile Adler Memorial Park course.
The tandem enabled the Mustangs to edge host Libertyville 47-52 in the nine-team meet and capture the Class 3A regional crown.
Under the new IHSA format this fall, the top seven teams advance to the Schaumburg sectional Saturday at Busse Woods — which means Mundelein and Libertyville will be joined by third-place Warren (86 points), fourth-place Lake Forest (106), Deerfield (134) in fifth, Stevenson (139) in sixth and seventh-place Zion-Benton (169).
“We were working off of each other’s energy and it’s so much better when you work as a team,” said Naughton. “That just motivates everybody on the team when they see everybody working together and we were not satisfied with fourth place last week (at conference).”
The Mustangs’ Emily Schlebecker was eighth, followed by Ellie Palacios (15th), Kelsey Loar (21st) and Marisa Perreault (22nd).
“We changed our race strategy from last week to this week and today we were conservative in the first mile before everybody had to surge,” said Mustangs coach John Osmanski. “The main thing is that we move on and they did absolutely fantastic.”
Libertyville certainly missed the presence of freshman North Suburban Conference champion Kristi Del Prato, who missed the meet because of a minor injury.
But the Wildcats did feature an impressive pack behind Nicole Jaffke in third, Maggie Fiorito sixth, Abigail Toohey in 10th and Lexie Zafiratos in 14th, while Emily Moroz and Meaghan Polk finished 18-19.
“She (Del Prato) was pretty sore Monday and Tuesday so we decided to be safe and hold her out until next week,” said Wildcats coach Joe Roth. “We would like to have come out on top, but I was just really happy with their energy and they really went after it especially without their top runner.”
Warren was led by the trio of freshman Becky Haight (ninth), junior Meg Tully (11th) and senior Andrea Saigh (12th).
“We had a pretty intense workout earlier in the week so they weren’t 100 percent fresh, but they did well,” said first-year Warren coach Brett Heimstead. “We moved up in the second half of the race and that is when we make it count. We have a solid front pack and their hard work is starting to pay off.”
Stevenson was led by freshman Kya Suzuki, who earned the final regional medal in fifth place. The Patriots’ pack was bolstered by Emily Cunningham in 23rd and Mackenzie Levy in 34th.
“We did a really good job of being aggressive in the second mile and passing people in the end,” said Patriots coach Don Proft. “She (Suzuki) faded a little bit in the end so that is something we’ll work on next week. But to get a medal in this meet is great.”