Luverne's Lexi Heitkamp reaches the finish line at the end of Saturday's Girls' Varsity Class A race during the Minnesota State Cross Country Championships in Northfield. Heitkamp, a seventh-grader, led Luverne to a 12th place effort as a team by placing 33rd individually.
By John Rittenhouse
Two teams and one individual from the Star Herald coverage area wrapped up the 2002 cross country season and the Minnesota State Championships staged on the St. Olaf College campus in Northfield Saturday.
The Luverne girls and Hills-Beaver Creek-Ellsworth-Edgerton boys made their initial appearances at the state meet as teams, and Luverne senior Jake Studer made his second consecutive appearance at the state classic as an individual.
According to the coaches of the athletes involved, the local runners represented the area well.
The H-BC-E-E boys, who won their first section title the week before, placed sixth in a 16-team field.
Luverne’s girls, the Section 3A runners up, finished 12th out of 16 complete teams. Studer placed 62nd individually in a 159-runner boys' field.
“We had a good meet,” said Luverne coach Bruce Gluf. “I'm not disappointed at all by the girls placing 12th as a team, or Jake placing 62nd individually. All our kids had a fantastic year, and there’s not a lot of people who can say they have run at a state cross country meet before.”
The LHS girls can be proud of their efforts as a team.
Their 148-point total placed them 18 points ahead of East Grand Forks, which finished 13th as a team with 266 counters.
Luverne was within striking distance of placing 10th as Winona Cotter (232 points) and Lake City (246), teams finished 10th and 11th, by outscoring the Cards by 16 and two points respectively.
Since the Cardinal girls and Patriot boys were involved in team competition, every runner on the squad received two official places. The overall place they were awarded is based on where they finished in the complete field. The adjusted place is based on where the runners finished among all other runners involved in the team competition.
A seventh-grader set the pace for Luverne at the state meet. Lexi Heitkamp, who became Luverne's top runner during the late stages of the season, placed 33rd overall with a time of 16:22.
“Lexi ran a great race,” Gluf said.
Heitkamp's adjusted place is 16th, and that number counted towards Luverne's team tally along with sophomore Amanda Saum, freshmen Kelsey Dooyema and Victoria Arends and junior Sadie Dietrich.
Saum's adjusted place was 26th, Saum 60th, Arends 69th and Dietrich 77th.
Saums placed 48th overall with a time of 16:35. Dooyema placed 96th in 17:18, Arends 106th in 17:28 and Dietrich 116th in 17:43.
Sophomores Jessica Willers and Brianna Studer ran without influencing the team scoring.
Willers had an adjusted place of 109th and an overall place of 150th with a time of 20:11. Studer had an adjusted place of 110th and an overall place of 151st with a time of 20:15.
Jake Studer completed his high school cross country career at the state meet.
Studer, who placed 58th at state as a junior in 2001, finished 62nd overall with a time of 18:08 Saturday.
“Jake finished a little back from where he did last year, but 62nd is not too bad,” Gluf said. “I thought Jake ran a smart race. He went out hard and had enough left to pass some people at the end.”
Studer won't be a part of the LHS program next season, but all seven girls' varsity runners and some promising young boys coming back has Gluf feeling optimistic about Luverne’s cross country future.
“We had a great year, and that goes for both our girls and boys. We showed a lot of improvement from the junior high level on up, and it was because the kids had a great work ethic. I can't say enough about these kids,” he said.
The H-BC-E-E boys also have reason to be proud of their season and their performance at the state meet.
The Patriots nipped Blue Earth Area (191-192) to place sixth as a team. H-BC-E-E finished 19 points away from finishing third in the team standings as La Crescent (172 points), Perham (180) and Eveleth-Gilbert (185) were teams that were in striking distance of the Patriots at meet's end.
“We finished sixth as a team out of 16 teams, and we were 19 points out of third place,” said Patriot coach Tom Goehle. “I'm extremely proud of our guys for placing sixth. You always want to finish higher, but we could easily have done worse and dropped out of the Top Ten.”
Goehle had a good idea that Staples-Motley and St. Cloud Cathedral, teams that finished first and second in the Class A standings with 77 and 127 points respectively, would finish one and two. After offering that, he added that places three through 10 would be up for grabs.
Goehle's predictions proved to be fairly accurate as 52 points separated the teams that placed third through 10th.
Along with leading his team to a sixth-place finish, sophomore Tyler Bush became the second H-BC-E-E runner to earn all-state status during the course of the race in as many years.
Bush, the Patriots' top performer all season, placed 15th individually out of 159 runners. The top 25 finishers in the race make the All-State Class A Team.
Brad Haak placed 14th at the state meet last year to become the first Patriot to make the all-state team.
Since H-BC-E-E was competing as a team, Bush’s adjusted place (which is the place an individual finished compared with all other members of 16 teams involved in the varsity race) was ninth.
Senior Zach Hadler, sophomore Kale Wiertzema, junior Todd Alberty and sophomore Greg Van Batavia made contributions to H-BC-E-E’s team tally.
Hadler’s adjusted place was 33rd in 18:08. Wiertzema (43rd in 18:20), Alberty (51st in 18:27) and Van Batavia (55th in 18:29) affected the scoring with their adjusted finishes.
Overall, Hadler, Wiertzema, Alberty and Van Batavia finished 60th, 76th, 87th and 92nd respectively.
Junior Lee Jackson and sophomore Derek Haak ran without influencing the scoring.
Jackson, who ran an 18:40, finished 66th in the adjusted standings and 108th overall. Haak, who ran a 19:47, finished 104th in the adjusted standings and 150th overall.
Considering all of his runners, with the exception of Halder, will be back next year, one would think Goehle is looking forward to the 2003 season.
The coach, however, has a different take on the situation.
“Right now we're spending most of our time being thankful for making it to state this year, instead of looking ahead to next season,” he said.
“There is a lot of time between now and next season, and we can put next year on the back burner for now. Besides, just because you were good one year doesn't necessarily mean you will have one the next year. The potential is there, but it will take a lot of hard work to get back to state.”
Here is a look at the final Class A girls' and boys' team standings from the state meet.
Class A girls: New London-Spicer 109, Staples-Motley 118, United South Central 152, Canby-Minneota-Lincoln HI 164, St. Cloud Cathedral 172, Minnehaha Academy 190, Hermantown 195, Mesabi East 201, Paynesville 207, Winona Cotter 232, Lake City 246, Luverne 248, East Grand Forks 266, Visitation 268, Minnesota Valley Lutheran 286, Northland-Deer River 379.
Class A boys: Staples-Motley 77, St. Cloud Cathedral 127, La Crescent 172, Perham 180, Eveleth-Gilbert 185, H-BC-E-E 191, Blue Earth Area 192, Warroad 202, Canby-Minneota-Lincoln HI 213, Plainview 224, Annandale 235, Minnehaha Academy 260, East Grand Forks 266, United South Central 283, Mayer Lutheran 350, Duluth Marshall 350.