St. Charles East 2nd, Marmion 3rd at SCN Invite
Sandburg brought its top two runners to St. Charles North's Invitational Saturday at LeRoy Oakes and ran its three through nine at a race in Peoria.
Those top two - Sean Torpy and Dylan Jacobs - finished 1-2 on a new-look LeRoy Oakes course in 15:06.7 and 15:08.4, leading Sandburg to the team title with 67 points.
St. Charles East finished second at 76 and Marmion scored 97 for third.
"We were OK," Marmion coach Dan Klatt said. "Certainly not one we were peaking for. We have some improvement to make but I like where they are. They have a lot of confidence. We'll be excited to come back and take another shot at regionals (on the same course) and hopefully fulfill our goal this year and make it downstate."
Sophomore Michael Ronzone (5th, 15:46.1) and senior Andrew Burroughs (6th, 15:48.2) led Marmion, and there were others who impressed Klatt.
"Three guys stuck out to me," Klatt said. "Charlie Zimmer, here's a guy last year during cross country got hurt in gym class. So he wasn't able to run for six months, he's come back and been a boon."
Zimmer was 12th Saturday in 16:02, and teammate Andrew Lifka finished 20th in 16:09.
"Andrew had a tough race last week and it's easy to lose confidence and he didn't," Klatt said. "He came back and rebounded really well.
"Jimmy (Milder, 16:53 for 77th) is one of our toughest guys," Klatt continued. "He's starting to close the gap. I don't think anyone one ran poorly."
A tight pack led St. Charles East to second place. Their top four runners finished within 11 seconds.
"The guys ran well," Saints coach Chris Bosworth said. "It is definitely a more challenging course than in the past. Our strength is our pack and we had a split of 32 seconds between 1 and 5. This was a good meet going into our off week."
Seniors Michael Gerkin (8th, 15:55) and Mark Sciurba (9th, 15:56.0) paced the pack followed closely by Jack Rzepecki (11th, 16:01.0) and Brett Izzo (14th, 16:06.0).
Fifth runner Anthony Zilla finished 34th in 16:20.0.
Junior Tyler Dau continued to lead Geneva taking 10th in 15:58.
"Tyler is still running really well," Vikings coach Bob Thomson said. "He was right there with some really good runners."
The Vikings placed sixth as a team. Boon Andrews was 36th, Brian Kuehl 39th and Josh Rodgers 45th.
Jacobs and Waubonsie Valley both scored 212 points. The Warriors earned seventh on sixth runner Riley Miller's 62nd-place finish.
Kyle Ross paced Kevin Christian's Jacobs squad in 18th with teammate Garrett Brenizer in 27th.
"The goal was to get out hard," Christian said. "Our boys have been getting out too slow and then been complacent with where they are at. We said if you go out in 20th place there's a good chance you'll finish in 20th place. That's kind of what happened today.
"The rest of our guys went out in the 30s and 40s and finished in the 40s. Our guys are coming around extremely well right now. We had a slow start to the season. They are ready to go right now. That team looks a lot better than a month ago. Very excited."
Like many of the coaches and runners, Christian praised the work by North Stars coaches Kevin Harrington and Shari Hayes setting up the new layout at LeRoy Oakes.
"I like the new course a lot," Christian said. "Twenty, 30 seconds slower but it's a neat course. They did a great job. Very impressed with what they did here. We'll be coming back. We love it."
Host St. Charles North took 10th, one spot ahead of Batavia. Brett Lee paced the North Stars in 38th while Shea Bastian was 23rd for the Bulldogs.