Girls Third, Boys Eighth in Season Opener
In what has become a pattern the last few years, the Spartan Cross Country teams kicked off their season on a new course, the fourth new opening race in as many years. Expectations for the season were high with the boys entering the season ranked fourth in Cincinnati and tenth in Ohio, and the girls ranked sixth and eighth, respectively, in preseason polling. Racing at the hot and fairly hilly Brian Plasma Invitational, both the boys and girls hoped to send a signal that they are still major contenders for another state meet qualification.
With five of the seven girls that competed at the state meet running on Saturday, the girls were in good position to finish well in the standings. Running the first 5k race of the morning, the girls were not quite sure what to expect. Senior Kaitlin Price led the Spartan girls finishing fifth in 19:53, nearly 20 seconds than her first race last season. Lauren Young and Megan Plichta were the next finishers placing fourteenth and fifteenth, respectively. Jillian Jaworek finished twenty-seventh in 21:34 and Lauren Keen rounded out the Turpin scorers finishing thirty-fourth in 22:15. Scoring 95 points, the Turpin girls placed third behind a strong Mason team, and just one point behind Sycamore.
The Turpin boy’s varsity team was marked with inexperience on Saturday. Two runners, Jon Risher and Alex Williams were competing in their first cross country race of their career, while two more, Joe Murray and Jack Reeder were running their first varsity race. Although times averaged 30-40 seconds slow for nearly all Turpin runners, the one exception came from junior standout Nicholas El-Khoury. El-Khoury ran just six seconds off PR time finishing sixth in 16:21. Seniors Drew DiSabatino and Zach Smith were the second and third Spartan finishers running respective times of 17:31 and 18:19. Sophomore Joe Murray and senior Jack Reeder were the final scoring Spartans, finishing in 18:31 and 19:11. With 183 points, the Turpin guys finished in eighth place.
Next Saturday, Turpin will be running at the very familiar Voice of America Park. Rejoining the Turpin boys team will be two of its varsity runners. Dave Rodriguez has been rehabbing from an ankle injury, while Alex Polivka was unable to compete on Saturday.