TRACY -- Adrian senior Jordin Kopplow and Worthington freshman Amanual Fissiha each finished third in their respective varsity races Thursday at the huge 16-team Panther Invitational high school cross country meet at the Tracy Golf Course.
Kopplow clocked a time of 16 minutes and 21 seconds over the 4,000-meter girls' course and was followed in the chute by senior teammate Megan Sauer, who finished fourth with a time of 16:29.
Fissiha ran an impressive time of 17:33 to lead the Trojans in the 5,000-meter boys' race, pacing a stellar 3-5-7-10-11 scoring finish for WHS, which placed a solid second in the team standings with 36 points.
Ethan Spittle (17:58), Matt Jirele (18:14), Anthony Luft (18:25) and Ian Stewart (18:33) completed the scoring for the Trojans in places five, seven, 10 and 11, respectively, while Nathan Landwehr (13, 18:48) and Gordy Moore (16, 18:55) also bettered the 19-minute mark and gave Worthington seven of the meet's top-16 finishers.
"That's pretty good," declared Trojans' head coach Ken Henkels. "There were close to 100 runners in the race and to get seven of the first 16 shows remarkable team balance. Having all seven run under 19 minutes in their first meet of the season is even better than we expected."
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Leading Adrian's boys were first-time runners Taylor Recker and Collin Kemper, both sophomores. Recker ran the course in 19:41 and placed 24th, while Kemper was 37th with a time of 20:04.
Redwood Valley won the boys' team title with 21 points, while Canby/Minneota/Lincoln HI claimed the girls' team championship.
Adrian finished second in the girls' standings, as Morgan Sauer (sixth, 16:48) and Nicole Slater (11, 17:24) also had strong finishes for the Dragons.
Trojans Alica Darling and Meredith Moore finished right on Slater's heels in places 12 and 13, respectively, with identical times of 17:25.
Stephanie Jaycox (16, 17:43) was Worthington's third girl to enter the chute, while Ariana Lopez (36, 19:47) and Kacey Contreras (51, 21:04) completed the Trojans scoring (128 points).
Rachel Koller (57, 21:28) and Hope Reeves (66, 22:25) were Worthington's sixth and seventh runners, respectively, in the varsity race.
Jessica Darling finished 12th in the 2,000-meter girls' junior varsity/junior high race with a time of 8:43.
Logan Waldner ran the same course in 7:24 and placed sixth in the boys' junior varsity/junior high meet, while teammates Zach Clark (ninth, 7:33), Cameron Jenson (15, 7:47), Peter Scholtes (16, 7:49), Jacob Prunty (22, 7:54), Caleb Wede (23, 7:54), Desalegn Demenfes (24, 7:55) and Sam Talsma (27, 7:58) also bettered the eight-minute mark in the large field of runners, which had over 120 finishers.
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The Trojans tallied 68 points on finish places 6-9-15-16-22 in that combined junior varsity/junior high race for boys.
The meet was delayed for an hour due to thunder, lightning and rain, but all four races ran smoothly after conditions improved.
