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Lone home meet coming up Thursday at Ely Golf Course
The competition wasn’t as fierce, but Ely’s cross country teams had a strong day Tuesday at Deer River and picked up their first meet victories of the season.
Molly Brophy was the runner-up among the girls and Otto Devine paced the Ely boys, and both teams grabbed first-place finishes at the WarEagles Invitational, held at Blueberry Golf Course.
The wins came in advance of the Timberwolves’ only home appearance of the season.
That’s set for Thursday, at the Ely Golf Course, for the annual Ely Invitational.
Duluth East, Duluth Marshall, Proctor, South Ridge, Chisholm, Mesabi East and Rock Ridge are among the schools set to take part in the event, which will bring several hundred runners to Ely.
Admission is free, concessions will be available, and the first race will begin around 4 p.m.
Head Coach Jayne Dusich said the home meet not only provides a chance for her team to run at home, but it gives her another look at her lineup as the home stretch of the regular season approaches.
Section competition is slated for the end of October.
“I still don’t know who’s going to run sections and all these meets make a difference,” said Dusich, who has led the program since its inception in the mid-1990s. “I know the top runners, but I don’t know the four after that so we’re kind of working on that and the kids are working hard to improve their times.”
Despite some absences due to illness, the Wolves looked good at Deer River.
“It was a small meet, but still good,” said Dusich. “Cromwell and International Falls both had good runners. They still had to work and we had some good times... Each team also won a cake. That was their motivation.”
Brophy, the defending 7A girls champion, was behind only Chisholm’s Olivia Pascuzzi in the 5,000-meter varsity girls event.
Brophy, a sophomore, finished in 20:12.4.
“Molly had a better race,” said Dusich. “She still needs to drop a little more time but she’s getting down more to where she should be.”
Ely freshman Mattie Lindsay continued a solid season and was fifth among 37 runners in 21:37.4, while sophomore Isabelle Macho was eighth in 22:31.7.
Junior Elsa Ellerbroek cracked the top-10 and was 10th overall in 23:14.3.
Ely edged International Falls by eight points to win the varsity girls team title.
Among the boys, Devine was fourth in a field of 43 (18:41.2), while senior Eli Olson took a big step forward and placed fifth (18:43.6).
“Eli had a very good race, a minute faster than his last best time,” said Dusich. “Some of these guys are getting into the 18-minute mark now, and Max Cochran cut a minute off his time and had a good race.”
Sophomore Mason Kurnava (18:52.3) took sixth, with sophomore Oliver Hohenstein (19:15) in ninth and senior Milo McClelland placed 12th in 19:49.6.
The Wolves outpaced Cromwell by 14 points to take the team title while three other squads lagged behind.
Ely also scored a sweep in junior high competition, with Wyatt Devine (8:52.9), Blake Houde (9:34.7) and Alden Harding (9:37.1) leading a one-two-three finish in the 2,500 meter junior high boys event.
Katy Brophy of Ely won the junior high girls race in 10:15.8, with Mirabella Lepisto (10:57.3) in third, Moxie Lindsay (12:11.2) in fifth and Sally Dunn (12:16.7) sixth.
Other results included: Boys Varsity
16. Aksel Skustad 20:19; 17. Dylan Durkin, 20:24.4; 26. Trenton Bishop, 21:38.5; 27. Mason Molden, 21:53.1; 36. Max Cochran, 23:40.3.
Girls Varsity
15. Anna Dunn, 24:40.1; 17. Anna Ziegenmeyr, 24:50.7; 20. Lillie O’Neil, 25:44.8; 21. Brandy Strange, 26:02.2; 22. Lucy Dunn, 26:07.7; 31. Aila Harding, 29:39.1.
