Boys cross country: Warren's Wiley stakes his claim as a sectional champ
With such a long history already in the record books taking a one-year break last year, area boys cross country runners could not wait for their chance to qualify for the historic 75th IHSA boys state cross country meet Saturday morning at the Class 3A Hoffman Estates sectional.
New Trier was the first team to punch its ticket to Peoria's historic Detweiller Park with 93 points as the Trevians were followed closely by runner-up Barrington (99 points), and third-place Lake Zurich (100 points).
With one less IHSA sectional this year, seven teams and 10 at-large individuals will head to the state meet starting with Palatine (116) in fourth, Hersey (136) in fifth, Warren (152) in sixth, and Prospect (185) in seventh.
Warren senior Luke Wiley showed that he is the real deal with a winning time of 15 minutes-flat on the sloppy, 3-mile Busse Woods course as he held off New Trier's Nick Falk by four seconds down the stretch.
It was a bittersweet day for Wiley and the Blue Devils reaching state without the presence of longtime former coach Bill Dawson, who died in September of 2020 from esophageal cancer.
"The goal was just to try to win as easy as possible," said the University of North Carolina-bound Wile, y who was coached by Dawson for three years. "It will definitely be tough, and I'm definitely going to put myself on the line to try to win a state title."
Warren coach Brett Heimstead believes Wiley can definitely make a serious push for the state crown.
"He was sixth last year in the unofficial state meet and second in the 2-mile last spring so I knew he had the talent to get to where he wanted to be," said Heimstead, who has moved from being the girls coach to the boys coach.
"His goal since day one has been to win the state title and the key was the work he put in this summer."
Barrington was able to edge Lake Zurich by one point behind Joey Furlong (sixth), Max Lewis (15th), Zach Daniel (22nd), and Ryan Fryer (23rd).
"All our guys were in a good position halfway through the race and they executed a beautiful team plan today," said Barrington coach Tom Root. "(Furlong) loves to just get out and beat anyone he can, and he does a really good job of not getting too excited early and keeping his composure."
Lake Zurich's No. 1 runner was Dylan Myers in third while teammate Danny Burns placed seventh. Braden Eckman placed 20th for the Bears.
"We ran really well, 93-99-100. It's tough to swallow the close loss, and we knew coming in it was going to come down to a few places to win," said Lake Zurich coach J.B. Hanson. "It's a really strong field so we knew it was going to be tight, and Dylan Myers had a really strong last mile."
Palatine was led by the trio of Mason Krieg in fifth, Jack Casaccio in 10th, and Mukal Verma in 16th.
"We had our normal No. 4 guy (Andy Hansen) go down 150 yards in, but he got up and steadily worked his way up through the race," said Palatine coach Joe Parks. "We went 5-10-16 so that helped a lot, and we're looking at a 30 to 35 point drop with Andy Hansen falling. But I'm just proud of the guys and it is our first trip to state since 2015."
Hersey was led by Sean Safford in fourth and teammate Connor Oiler in eighth. Prospect's duo of T.J. Garland (12th), and Luka Kuzmanovic (14th) led its pack.
At-large qualifiers included Libertyville's Jack Hamilton (17th), Maine East's Lukasz Iwanowski (21st), Fremd's Theodore Cunningham (27th), and Libertyville's Ali Faiz (28th).
Jacobs placed 12th as a team behind the trio of Mitchell Ruffin (45th), Alec Melendez (47th), and Aidan DeMuth (50th).