Girls repeat as sectional champs

While cross country meets were smaller and run differently this season due to the Covid-19 pandemic, at least one thing stayed the same from last year.

The Ozaukee High School girls will compete in the Division 3 state meet as sectional champions.

The Warriors scored 43 points to beat Burlington Catholic Central’s 59 to win the four-team Prairie School Sectional last Saturday. Albany scored 59 points and Dodgeland had 69. The top two teams advance to state.

Five different runners have led the Warriors this season, and this time junior Sophie Uhlenberg took charge. She finished the 5,000-meter course  in 21 minutes, 20.9 seconds, good for ninth place of 37 runners. But her place for the team score was sixth since runners from incomplete teams don’t count toward the team scores.

Freshman Becky Hoffmann was right behind in 10th (seventh in team score) in 21:21, and senior Grace Tinder was 12th (ninth) in 21:21.9.

Clara McKee took 14th (10th) in 21:52.1, and senior Allison Clark was 15th (11th) in 22:01.5.

With only four teams at the sectional as opposed to as many as 16 during non-pandemic years, coach Andrew Pfeuffer knew scores would be lower and the slowest runner would only score 28 points.

“This means the scores would be decided by a marginal difference in most sectional meets. For us without a heavy hitter out front, we needed all our athletes to place high to offset most teams No. 1 and No. 2 runners who could potentially be in front of our pack,” he said.

“Our girls did just that and placed all seven of our runners in front of all the other teams’ No. 3 runners to secure the win.”

Ozaukee’s No. 6 runner, freshman Meredith Clark was 16th, (12th) in 22:02.8, and senior Kelley Large was 17th (13th) in 22:08.

The Warriors executed a strategy that Pfeuffer had drilled into their heads.

“All season we have preached how important each girl is to our team and our team success throughout the year and they have really bought into it,” Pfeuffer said.

“One other benefit to our pack running is that anyone of our girls can take the lead at any meet or practice and we can still perform well.”

Random Lake’s Halle Van Horn won the meet by 36 seconds in 19:33.5 and advanced to state as one of the five individual qualifiers from the sectional.

To avoid large crowds, the WIAA split the locations for the Divisions 1, 2 and 3 state meets this season and split each division into three sessions. The Division 3 race  will be Saturday, Oct. 31, at Maple Grove Venues in West Salem. Ozaukee runs in the third session at 3:30 p.m. with Gillett, Sevastopol and Burlington Catholic Central. Times will be compiled from all three sessions to determine placements.

Warriors send one boy to the state meet

Two Ozaukee boy runners qualified for the sectional meet after the team missed advancing from the sub-sectional by one point.

Junior Calvin McKee made the most of the opportunity and became the fifth and final individual qualifier not from a qualifying team to advance to state from the Prairie School Sectional.

McKee finished seventh in 17:57.3, beating out the next individual runner, Jacob Stroh of Palmyra-Eagle, by six seconds.

Warrior senior Matt Baldwin finished 14th in 18:24.5.

“I was really proud and happy for both Calvin and Matt, not only for what they did at sectionals but all season. Calvin has been our consistent No. 1 runner all season and is constantly learning and absorbing the sport in his second year with us. He’s truly a student of the sport and is fun to watch improve from week to week,” Pfeuffer said.

“For Matt, he ended his high school cross country career a meet earlier than he had hoped for but I know he left it all on the course and he followed the race plan to the best of his ability.”

McKee runs at 4:10 p.m. Saturday in West Salem.

Warrior girls win sub-sectional

The new Division 3 sub-sectional races this season  were held in two sessions of four teams each, with results compiled.

Not seeing everyone they were up against didn’t bother the Warrior girls. They won the Palmyra-Eagle Sub-Sectional with 25 points. Burlington Catholic Central was second with 50. The top two teams advance.

Tinder was third in 21:08.87, a personal record by 11 seconds. Hoffmann was fourth in 21:08.89, her best by 12 seconds. McKee was fifith in 21:18.23. Large was sixth in 21:33.57, and Uhlenberg was seventh in 21:36, with both turning in season-best times.

“We told them all week that they needed to push each other and race the clock if we wanted to advance and they did just that,” Pfeuffer said.

Ozaukee boys narrowly miss advancing

The Warrior boys took third by one point and never got to run against the two teams that beat them.

Ozaukee ran in the second session, which included four complete teams and a few runners from fifth.

In compiling results with the first session, the Prairie School won with 67 points and Kenosha St. Joseph had 70. Ozaukee scored 71.

McKee was second in 17:33.34. Baldwin was sixth in 18:15.06, a season best by 20 seconds. Both moved on to the sectional as two of the top five individual finishers not from a qualifying team.

Owen Klaus was eighth in 18:18.32. Tyler Mueller was 17th in 18:56.96 and Chase Miller was 38th in 20:16.49.

“We knew going in with the new format that every second would count if we wanted to advance our whole boys team.  Unfortunately, we needed every half second to get through as two of our runners were within about a half second of passing a person from session 1 and potentially moving us into a top two team position,” Pfeuffer said.

“It stings a little to get your team knocked out of the post season by teams you didn’t even get to race against, but I’m still proud of how our guys raced and left everything on the course.”