By Michael Newman
ilprepharrier.wordpress.com

Palatine, Ill — After Assumption HS won the Palatine Invitational girls team title in 2011 and returned back to Louisville, Coach Chuck Medley of fellow city school St. Xavier called Assumption’s coach Barry Haworth to ask him how his experience was at this meet in the northwest suburbs of Chicago.

“I told Chuck that we come up to this meet because the level of this competition is just unreal. This is one of the highest quality meets we could find,” said Haworth. “I told him if you want to get tested, here is where you come.”

Medley knew that he would have a special boys team in 2012 as he had five out of seven top runners returning from last year’s 5^th place team at the NXN Southeast Regional. “We knew that this invite would have some of the best talent in the country. We wanted to find out how good we were,” he said. “This is our best team ever.

Both teams left Deer Grove East Forest Preserve Saturday afternoon with team championships from this high-powered invitational. It also showed they should be considered top ten teams in the nation after convincing wins.

Girls Race: Flanagan sets another course record; Assumption’s 43-second split dominates team race.

So far in this 2012 season, it has not been a matter if Kaylee Flanagan (Lake Park HS, Roselle IL) will break a record in a race that she runs, but by how much. That was in doubt on Saturday morning as a cool front came through the Chicagoland area with winds gusting up to 25 mph and temperatures in the low 50s. The wind was going to take effect on the strategy in the race with teams.

It did not change the strategy for Flanagan.

At the 200-meter mark, she was already ahead of the pack. By the mile, the rest of the pack knew that Flanagan was not coming back as the lead grew to 15 seconds as she went through the first mile in 5:10. “I knew it was going to be windy. It was true cross country conditions and a true fun cross country race,” she said.

The pack followed with Palatine’s Tess Wasowicz leading the way. This was her home course and she knew how she wanted to run it on that day. Back near 8^th place the Assumption pack began, led by Bailey Davis and Katherine Receveur. They were just waiting for the right moment to make their move.

Flanagan looked like a machine as she closed in to the two-mile mark. There was no strain on her face, just a focus on the task at hand: getting to the finish line. The pack behind her was starting to thin out and take more definition of how the finish might end up. Wasowicz had strung out the pack, but had company in Sami Staples (Central HS, Crystal Lake IL), followed by a pair of freshman in Kaitlyn Ko (Buffalo Grove IL) and Lauren Conroy (Barrington IL). Lurking in 9-10-11 was the Assumption trio of Davis, Receveur and Emily Bean. They were waiting for the right moment.

The right moment for Flanagan was at sound of the starter’s position. The competition on this day was not with anyone in the race but with the clock at the finish line. She came to the line in 16:49, just breaking her course record by 2 seconds.

“Today, I just raced to race today. I knew I was not going to get a PR or anything. I just wanted to race and have a good time,” Flanagan concluded.

Watch the full interview with Kaylee Flanagan here

Davis and Receveur moved the last mile. They started picking off runners just as they went by the 2-3/4 point. Davis moved away from her teammate and went after Staples. With 600 to go, she had second and it was just a matter of sealing the deal by finishing. Her teammate Receveur just passed Staples in the last few meters to get third.

“Our coach said we went out a little too slow. We usually like to go out a little faster,” said Receveur. “We finished up okay.”

Watch the full interview with Bailey Davis & Katherine Receveur here

Watch the full interview with Crystal Lake’s Sami Staples here

Assumption’s control of the race in the last mile showed in the final results. They had 5 runners in the first 24 finishing with a 43-second split. Their 50-point total was 62 better than Lake Park. They made a statement in this race, but the Assumption coach did not think that it had a national impact.

“At some point, you have to trust the kids that they know what they are doing, but the end we had to execute it,” Coach Haworth said about the team’s slow start. “We weren’t trying to make a statement nationally. We will have opportunities to do that as the season progresses. Our goal today was to show enough of the potential that I think we have to feel confident when those big races come, we will be ready to make more of a national level statement.”

Boys Race: Close battles in both the team and individual races.

IL 3A #1 York came into this meet on a high after running a great team performance at the Richard Spring Invitational last Saturday in Peoria. St. Xavier KY ran a good team race last week defeating a US top-ten-rated Carmel IN at the Trinity/Valkyre Invitational in Louisville. Meanwhile, IL 2A #1 Jones College Prep of Chicago had come off a traumatic last ten days, not knowing if they would run in this invitational as the teachers in the Chicago Public School System were on strike. On Tuesday evening, the strike was settled and business returned to usual in the small school in the south loop of Chicago. The question was, would they be ready for this challenge?

The pace was fast for this course, considering the many turns that it twists around the Deer Grove East Forest Preserve as a pack of 10 runners passed by the mile in 4:45. Leading the way were two of the race favorites, Jack Keelan (St. Ignatius HS, Chicago IL) and Grant Nykaza (Beecher HS IL). Behind them was, among others, Harry Winter (Fremd HS, Palatine IL), Micah Beller (Niles North, Skokie IL), Jamison Dale (Jones College Prep, Chicago IL), and Connor Sheryak and Sam Lewis (St. Xavier HS, Louisville KY).  Both St. Xavier and Jones Prep looked to be challenging for the lead. York’s pack, led by Chris May started around 21^st place and had 4 runners close together. Last week’s race plan was to move the second mile. This week, they were strung out, but within contact of each other. Also a factor early on was Barrington, who had runners tightly together near York.

Nykaza started to push the pace the second mile, daring anyone to stay with him. At every turn, Nykaza threw in a little surge pushing the pace a little faster. Keelan, Winter, Dale, Beller, Sheryak, and Lewis were now joined by Alex Baker (Central HS, Crystal Lake IL) and Ryan Burgoon (Barrington HS) as the pack started to string out as the two mile was passed in 9:45 by Keelan and Nykaza. It was still a tossup for the team lead. York moved up with May leading the way in 14^th and his teammates all in the top 20. Their 5^th runner Zach Herrera was in 43^rd and with Jones’ 5^th Kyle Maloney. St. Xavier had their two runners in the first 10, then three within the first 35. This was going to come down to the team that would not fall back.

The surges that Nykaza was making was taking a toll on everyone except Keelan.  The St. Ignatius senior refused to let Nykaza go. The pack was broken as this would come down who made the last move. With 800 meters to go, Keelan made the move he hoped that would be the definitive one in this race. Nykaza stayed there, refusing to budge. It was going to be who had the best kick.

“I trust my kick sometimes and it got me in today,” Nykaza said. “When I was kicking, he was kicking with me. I just had one more gear today.” That gear was in the last 100 meters where that little push was just enough to get him ahead of Keelan at the line by six tenths of a second.

“We went out fast—4:45 at the mile. It did not cause me too much worry. I was running on adrenaline at that point,” Keelan said afterwards. “This is different than last year, where I am using the races this year as learning experiences and having a feel of running a good cross country race.”

Watch the full interview with Keelan here

Nykaza is working on exorcising ghosts from last year. Especially his second-place finish at the state meet to Monticello’s Steve Schroeder last November.

“I think I have a little chip, especially since I have finished 2^nd twice and fourth one time. What would people think of me if I did not have a state title? This year I want to get it.”

Watch the full interview with Grant Nykaza here

Alex Baker moved in the last 600 meters to capture third, just ahead of Micah Beller and a charging Luke O’Connor (Jones College Prep, Chicago IL).

It took an hour to determine who would win the team title. Before the start of the race, the key for St. Xavier was having two of their front runners near or close to the tight pack of York. They succeeded in that with Connor Sheryak finishing 6^th ahead of York’s Chris May (8^th) with Sam Lewis close to May in 10^th. Last week, they had a 31-second split. Today, their split with their final two runners in 26-27 was 29 seconds. York had a 21-second through four, but there was a 25-second gap between four and five; that would not do it on this day. Jones, just like St. Xavier, made a strong move in the last mile with getting their four runners in the first 17, but the gap was too great between four and five. It was that close.

The 29-second split was the key for victory for St. Xavier as the places of the fifth runners doomed both York and Jones. The margin was 12 points between St. Xavier and York. Jones was only one point back in third.

“We did not come to the course until today. We had to leave after school yesterday and we just walked to the mile marker this morning,” said Medley, the aforementioned St. Xavier coach. “We moved beautifully the last mile. We have never been rated nationally in the top 10 before. We are looking beyond our state meet. We want to go either 1 or 2 at Southeast regionals and then to go to Nationals.”

“We were trying to work together at the mile,” said Sam Lewis. “He (Sheryak) did not run a great race last week, so we wanted to stay with each other. In the last mile, a York guy came beside me and I just tried to stay with him.”

Watch the full interview with Lewis & Sheryak here

It was a total 180 degree change of emotion for Jones coach Andrew Adelman. At the beginning of the week, it was the frustration of the possibility of not being able to run at this meet due to the teacher’s strike. On this day it was pride in what his runners did.

“We were just one point behind York,” Adelman said as he looked at the results, shaking his head. Jones College Prep is only in its fourth year of existence and they almost slayed the giant in York. “The biggest thing we told them all week to use whatever they were feeling as strength, whether it was anger, anxiousness, disappointment. Whatever that feeling was from prohibiting to do what they loved the last two weeks. We told them to express that feeling on the course. We knew they were going to come out hungry. We knew they were going to come out aggressive. We told them where we wanted them to be at the mile and then to move up from there.”

There was a feeling of doom and gloom in the York camp as the result came in. To feel so good a week earlier and then to feel the disappointment of defeat hit York coach Joe Newton.

“I am just disappointed that we ran to the top of the mountain last week and now we are down in the valley,” he said. “We have to go back to square one and start all over again. I thought we would win today because we ran so well last week. My job as a coach is to get them ready on the day and I think I feel like I let down on my coaching that I did not have them ready to day. We have to find someone to step up in that fifth spot. We have four guys that are tough as a son of a gun. That Kentucky team was tough today.”