Milton Cross Country wins all six races contested
North Oconee HS | Bogart, GA | By Andy Carr
On a cool crisp morning near Athens, GA, the Eagle cross country teams were victorious over as many as 21 schools in winning all the races at the meet hosted by the Titans.
Varsity Boys
Milton (1st-45 pts) took down 21 scoring schools with their dominant team race in securing the overall victory. 4A power Oconee County (2nd-72 pts) & North Hall (3rd-114 pts) were closest to the Eagles. Junior Everett Lawder (4th-16:23) paced Milton as the Eagles put all 5 of their scoring runners in the top-15 overall places, with each securing individual medals. Sophomore Will Chambers (7th-16:32) followed and was closely pursued by senior captain Justin Sevel (8th-16:42). Junior Jayin Batra (11th-16:52) & senior Aviv Oshri (15th-17:07) closed out the scoring. The race had 201 finishers.
Varsity Girls
Going into this meet, the Lady Eagles were predicted to get 4th but Milton turned the tables on that and defeated all 19 schools they faced. Milton (1st-76 pts) took down 4A perennial state podium team Westminster (2nd-77 pts) by 1-point! North Hall (3rd-84 pts) was just 8 pts back! Running near the front for almost two-thirds of the race, junior Caroline Spain (5th-19:40) ran to her 2nd-best performance ever! After falling late in the race, freshman Sadie Katekovich (10th-20:11), who was right behind Spain most of the race, still managed a 3-second personal best, her 4th of the season. Fellow seniors Macy Schadt (13th-20:29) & Ella Franke (14th-20:30) followed with Franke notching a 21-second personal best. A big performance came from sophomore Aarushi Dhawan (34th-21:27) as she passed many other teams top-4 finishers to record a 12-second personal best. 177 finishers were recorded.
JV Boys
The Eagles followed up their varsity counter parts & thoroughly dominated the race. Milton (1st-31 pts) made easy work of the field putting all their scorers in the top-10 overall finishing places while taking down 13 scoring schools. Junior Malin Schadt (1st-18:52) was the race’s overall winner with the remaining scoring Eagles then finishing 6th-9th place to record the easy team win.
JV Girls
Milton (1st-23 pts) made easy work of it by having all 9 entries in the race finish in the top-15 overall finishing places to receive individual race medals. The Lady Eagles outpaced 10 scoring schools in overwhelming fashion. Sophomore Cara Tenhundfeld (1st-22:48) took the lead with less than 800m to go & never looked back running to her 2nd best performance.
Open Boys & Girls
The final race of the meet was a co-ed affair with Milton easily winning both the boys (1st-16 pts) & the girls (1st-20 pts) races besting host North Oconee & Westminster respectively. Sophomore Boston VanBelle (1st-19:16) was the overall boy’s winner by close to a minute as the Eagles put 6 runners in the top-7 overall positions. Fellow sophomore Kennedy Manning (1st-24:08) raced to an 8-second personal best to win the ladies race and led the Lady Eagles with 4 finishers in the top-4 overall finishing positions.
The Milton varsity cross country teams next see action on Saturday, November 2nd at the GHSA 5A Sectional “A” race, hosted by Alexander HS at the Chattahoochee Hills event area in south Fulton County with the top-12 teams and top-20 individuals qualifying for the GHSA 5A State Meet which will be run Friday, November 8th in Carrollton, GA.
