By John RittenhouseTwo Hills-Beaver Creek-Ellsworth-Edgerton runners won cross country races at the Murray County Central Invitational in Slayton Tuesday.Patriots Tyler Bush and Mya Mann won event titles to highlight H-BC-E-E’s appearance at the meet.Bush took top honors in the boys’ varsity race, leading the field with a time of 17:49.Mann took top honors with a time of 18:30 in the girls’ junior varsity event.With Bush leading the way, H-BC-E-E placed fourth in a seven-team boys’ varsity field with 102 points.The Patriots topped Jackson County Central (103), Worthington (117) and Mountain Lake-Butterfield-Odin (169) in the standings. Southwest Christian (30), Luverne (76) and Adrian (81) led the field.Kale Wiertzema (20th in 19:26), Todd Alberty (21st in 19:30), Lee Jackson (26th in 19:48) and Adam Finke (53rd in 23:11) made contributions to H-BC-E-E’s team performance in varsity competition.Jill Weitgenant pushed Mann during the girls’ junior varsity race, finishing second in 18:40.Rayna Sandoval and Amanda Connors placed fourth and ninth in the junior varsity race with 19:16 and 20:07 times.Dustin Verhey placed fifth in 16:22 to lead H-BC-E-E runners in the boys’ junior varsity race.Derek Haak (seventh in 16:28), John Sandbulte (ninth in 16:50), Devin DeBoer (16th in 17:29), Tom Janssen (25th in 18:23) and Jared Drenth (27th in 18:53) joined Verhey in the junior varsity run.Cody Penning set the pace for H-BC-E-E runners in the boys’ junior high event, touring the course in 7:33 to place 14th.Grant Hoogendoorn (15th in 7:34), Tyler Larson (17th in 7:38), Luke Tiesler (18th in 7:40), Derek Drenth (25th in 18:10), Tom Nolte (28th in 8:25) and B.J Kruse (31st in 8:28) represented the Patriots in the junior high field.The H-BC-E-E runners will host a meet in Beaver Creek Monday.
