It was another year of the same results for the Emporia High boys cross country team, as the Spartans began their season with a team victory at the Manhattan Invitational at Manhattan’s Warner Park.
This is the fifth straight year that the boys squad has won the Manhattan Invitational.
The Spartans won despite only running five varsity runners as opposed to the allowed seven, with two of those runners — juniors Tyler Anliker and Jacob Davies — running in their first meet ever.
“It’s kind of been a tradition where we go up to Manhattan and run pretty well,” coach Mark Stanbrough said. “I think a lot of that is the summer background. Usually our guys have a group that will train together in the summer, and that helps us start off the season on a high, positive note.”
Junior Asher Delmott paced EHS on the day with a second-place finish in a personal-record time of 16 minutes, 47.41 seconds, 13 seconds behind the individual champion, Seaman’s Clay Schneider (16:34.78).
“I felt pretty good. Maybe I could have gone a little faster,” Delmott said. “My legs felt pretty good. I was kind of conservative since it was the first race, though.”
Delmott’s time was nearly two minutes faster than his time at the same course last year.
“I knew, watching him run this summer, that he was ready for a big breakthrough,” Stanbrough said.
Not far behind Delmott was junior Mike Robinson, who completed the 5K course in a time of 17:17.52 to finish seventh. Anliker (17:30.89) and Davies (17:41.93) finished 13th and 20th, respectively, with senior Ryan Parks rounding out the Spartans’ field by coming in 23rd with a time of 17:45.99.
“Out of the five guys we ran, two of them were running their first cross country race ever, and the other three had never been frontrunners,” Stanbrough said. “They stepped up and realized that this was the year they were going to have to be frontrunners.”
In capturing their fifth-consecutive Manhattan Invitational title, the No. 4-ranked EHS boys beat a trio of highly-ranked teams in fourth-place Lawrence (No. 4 in 6A), sixth-place Seaman (No. 8 in 5A) and Shawnee Heights (No. 6 in 5A).
“We wanted to keep the tradition of us winning there alive,” Delmott said. “I think our team did well.”
The Spartan girls also went up against a powerful field that including the likes of No. 1-ranked Seaman, the defending 5A state champion, and 6A powerhouses Manhattan and Lawrence.
Junior Michaela Reynolds came through with a second-place finish in leading the No. 4-ranked EHS girls to a third-place team finish behind Manhattan and Seaman.
Reynolds, the defending 5A state champion, ran with the lead pack for most of the race before Lawrence’s Kelly Renfro pulled away late to take the individual title in a time of 15:11.09 on the 4K course, while Reynolds finished eight seconds back at 15:19.30.
“I was fairly happy with how I did. My goal was to win, but I didn’t feel like I had one of my best races. I just didn’t feel on,” Reynolds said. “The girl who beat me was a very good runner, but still, I was a little disappointed.”
The race saw the return of senior Layne Moore, who is making a comeback from a hip injury that kept her out most of last season. Moore finished two spots behind Reynolds in a time of 15:46.40.
“I think it was a confidence builder for Layne,” Stanbrough said. “She hasn’t raced cross country in a year, and she’s just going to get better.”
Following Moore were freshmen Jenna Stanbrough, who came in 13th (16:31.35) and Kelsey Camien, who placed 20th (16:58.12). Running their first races, both freshmen gave the Spartans needed points by placing in the top 20.
“It was a fast race,” Stanbrough said. “For the first race of the year and for that hilly course, the times were exceptionally fast.”
Rounding out the field for the Spartans were senior Heather Coe (30th, 17:34.42) and junior Abby Lake (40th, 18:11.20).
“It was a good start for us,” Stanbrough said. “The good thing about it was that I can see we’ve got a lot of potential, and you should have a lot of room to improve. You don’t want to do everything in the first meet. We’ve got a lot of room to improve, but the thing I’m excited about is that we’ve got a lot of potential there yet.”
The next action for the Spartan cross country squads will be Saturday, when EHS holds its only home meet of the season, the Emporia Invitational, at 9 a.m. at Jones Park.
Girls tennis has strong showing in opener
The Emporia High girls tennis team began its season Saturday at the Wichita Collegiate Invitational, and the Spartans came out with one of their best finishes in years at the invitational.
The Spartans finished sixth out of 12 teams, compiling 48 points. Emporia High’s point total was just eight points out of third place, as Kapaun Mt. Carmel and Wichita Collegiate-Blue each had 56 points.
“I was very pleased. Team-wise, that was one of our stronger starts to the season,” coach Melinda Flohr said. “The Wichita Collegiate meet is always one of, if not the toughest meet of the season for us just because they bring in top teams from all across the state and from all classifications.”
The Spartans’ No. 1 singles player, Hallie Kretsinger, began her day with victories over Derby (8-1) and Arkansas City’s (8-0) top players.
Kretsinger dropped her final two matches to opponents from Maize, 8-5, and Bishop Carroll, 8-1, to finish eighth individually.
“Hallie’s first two matches, she played very, very solid,” Flohr said, “Her last few matches, even though she ended up losing them, she went up against some very quality players ... and she played solid all day. I was extremely pleased with her play.”
Amanda Roberts also gave EHS a strong outing, as she finished 16th with an 8-5 win over her first-round opponent from Wichita Collegiate-Gold before losing to her next two matches, the last because of a knee injury.
“The downside of the whole tournament, from my standpoint, is that Roberts went down with an injury in her third match and was not able to continue the rest of the day,” Flohr said. “She had played great, and were just hoping for good news with her injury.”
The doubles team of Rachael Bachman and Emilia Chiroy took home the best placing of the day for EHS, as the two went 3-1, defeating teams from Wichita Collegiate-Blue, Maize and Blue Valley Northwest to finish third.
McKenzie Cinelli and Sarah Watkins also finished their day with a 3-1 doubles record, but because of a first-round 8-7 loss to the team from Smoky Valley, Cinelli and Watkins finished 17th after rattling off three straight wins to finish the tournament.
“Both of our doubles teams were very impressive to me,” Flohr said. “Each team played very solid and had some very good wins.”
The next action for the girls tennis team is today at Valley Center.
Boys soccer still winless
after falling in shootout
The Emporia High boys soccer team began the week-long Titan Classic on Monday in Wichita with a 1-0 loss to Wichita North.
The Spartans (0-2) battled North to a scoreless tie through regulation and two overtimes before falling on penalty kicks.
“They (Wichita North) had more shots than we did, and while they weren’t really dangerous shots, they did have a lot of them,” coach Steve Pearson said. “It’s a sad way to end a game — in a shootout — but you’ve got to end it sometime or else it will just go on forever. Both sides had very good goalies and the defenses played very tough too.”
Wichita North out-shot the Spartans 22-8, but Pearson said nearly all of North’s shots came from outside the 18-foot box, making it easy for EHS freshman goalie Cory Obermeyer to collect his 22 saves, the highest save total of his young career.
Emporia High continues play at the Titan Classic Wednesday with a matchup against Wichita East, which lost to Hutchinson on Monday.