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Boys cross country: Becker's best at Grant's Taylor Invitational

There was no stopping Crystal Lake South junior Jack Becker on Saturday morning at the 18th Annual J.T. Taylor Invitational hosted by Grant.

Becker headed to the front of the field early and never looked back on the 3-mile Camp Henry Horner cross country course as he won the race in 15:39.28 to beat the runner-up by almost 30 seconds.

Zion-Benton held off Richmond-Burton 60-73 to capture the team title, while Crystal Lake South took third place with 96 points. Grayslake North put together a solid effort to take fourth place with 163 points while Carmel Catholic was a very close fifth with 171.

Becker has been running very well in the early stages of the 2016 campaign as the Gators' top runner in the big weekend races.

"It was a good race, the weather was great, and I was just trying to work on my kick," said Becker, who ran a 14:28 last weekend at Warren. "At Warren (Jon) Prus ran under 15 minutes and we've got some guys injured right now. But hopefully they'll be back soon and we'll have a really strong team."

Seventh-place finisher Prus is a proven commodity for the Gators after placing 28th in the state in Class 3A and just missing the all-state team as a junior last fall.

Junior Ryan Foster is also looking good for CLS with a ninth-place finish Saturday to give the Gators a very formidable trio of top runners.

"He (Becker) is running well and hopefully he can keep it up, and our third guy (Foster) ran really well," said CLS coach Rich Eschman. "Prus struggled today ending up in seventh place and our fourth guy didn't run today because of a hip injury. Our No. 5 guy ran in the fresh-soph race so he will help the team next week at the Peoria meet."

Grayslake North's pack featured a strong 1-2 punch with senior Liam O'Connell placing eighth, and senior teammate Cameron Detweiler placing 21st for the Knights. Junior Marcus Sandroni placed 36th as Grayslake North's third runner.

"Liam O'Connell was working hard today, his goal is to get to state, and he's doing everything he needs to do," said Grayslake North coach Brandon Boyd. "Marcus (Sandroni) has been strong all season and doing really well, and Cam (Detweiler) had a decent race in 21st place."

Carmel's pack was led by senior Steve Lacke in 17th place while junior teammate Jack Teehan added a 34th-place finish for the Corsairs.

"Steve Lacke ran really well, and he's been coming on strong lately," said Carmel coach Jim Halford, whose team has been trying to build more depth. "We have no depth, but we've got five solid kids and they got second place the other day at Warner Park in Chicago."

Host Grant was led by freshman Justin Splitt in 14th place and senior teammate John Schmidt in 16th.

"He (Splitt) ran our fastest time at Peoria last weekend and as a freshman he's already established himself as one of our top guys," said Grant coach Jeff Durlak. "Schmidt was all-conference last year and the big thing for him is he has been able to stay healthy and he had a good summer."

Wauconda's troops were led by junior Adam Fox in 23rd place while junior Marco Hernandez was Round Lake's top runner in 26th place. Junior Nathan Ehrenhofer added a 28th-place run for the host Bulldogs.

"For our guys I'm happy with the way they ran today," said Wauconda coach Jeff Helberg. "It's a new course, they altered it from last year, and our top four are definitely showing their strenghth. We're just trying to find our five through seven runners right now."

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