QUINCY - Edwardsville junior runner Emily Nuttall continued her very successful season with a 10th place finish in the individual race as the Tigers advanced to next week's state meet with a third-place finish at the IHSA Class 3A girls sectional cross country meet Saturday morning at Bob Mayes Park in Quincy.
Minooka won the team championship with 51 points, edging out Yorkville for the title, with Yorkville placing second with 56 points, the Tigers were third with 149 points, Lockport Township was fourth with 158 points, Plainfield North was fifth with 162 points, sixth place went to O'Fallon with 177 points, and New Lenox Lincoln-Way West claimed the last team berth with a seventh-place finish with 182 points. Frankfort Lincoln-Way East was eighth with 188 points, Normal Community was ninth with 189 points and the host Blue Devils rounded out the top ten with 269 points. Belleville West came in 16th with 418 points.
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The quality of the field in the girls race was one that made the sectional one of the better ones in the state, and the Tigers did exceptionally well to finish third.
"On the girls' side, the Quincy sectional had more depth and ranked teams than the boys side going in," said Edwardsville head coach George Patrylak. "We knew we couldn't touch Minooka or Yorkville, but we hoped to finish between third to sixth. The girls outperformed their ranking by several spots"
Nuttall continued her vast improvement this season with her race, where she also earned All-Sectional honors with her finish.
"Junior Emily Nuttall continues to impress, earning her first All-Sectional honors," Patrylak said. "To put it in perspective, last year, she finished 31st in the Olney Richland County Class 2A sectional, and this year, it was a top ten finish in one of the better sectionals in the state. Olivia Coll ran another solid race for us, coming in as our number two, but Maya Lueking ran one of our best races of the day."
Yorkville's Anna Hunter won the individual race with a time of 18:26.0, with O'Fallon's Peyton Scheippe second at 18:31,1, third place went to Caroline Schoen of Homewood-Flossmoor at 18:38.8, in fourth place was Gabriella McCollom of Minooka at 18:48.1, Normal Community's Ali Ince was fifth at 18:48.9, Kayla Shea of Lockport Township was sixth with a time of 18L49.3, seventh place went to Audrey Boles of Minooka at 18:54.2, Margaret Hunter of Yorkville was eighth at 19:03,7, Gabriella Kics of Minooka came in ninth at 19:08.0 and Nuttall rounded out the top ten with a time of 19:13.7.
Along with Nuttall, Coll had a time of 19:48.4, Lueking was in at 20:07.5, Emma Patrick was in at 20:21.5, Maddie Miller was right behind at 20:21.6, Whitney Dyckman was clocked in 20:23..6, Madison Strotheide had a time of 20:29.9 and Bella Horsfall came in at 21:10.2
Only one local runner, Granite City's Lauryn Fenoglio, ran as an individual, coming in with a time of 21:59.6, failing to qualify for state.
The TIgers will now prepare fothe IHSA state meet next Saturday at its tradtional home of Detweiler Park in Peoria, and Patrylak is aware of how good his team is, and is proud of their accomplshments.
"This girls team is pretty special, with the fact that our pace is so solid," Patrylak said, "where somebody always picks up an athlete who's having a less than perfect day,"
The goals for the girls' state meet will be the same as for the boys.
"I think the girls' expectations need to be very similar to the boys," Patrylak said, "where alternatively, a top 15 finish would be our goal,"
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