Jackson, MI. – On Wednesday at Ella Sharp Park all the teams from the local area of the Cascades Conference all met to compete in the grueling cross-country conference championship.
The Leslie girls jetted their way to a conference title, while in the boy’s race, Jonesville came away as co-champion with Hanover-Horton.
Conference champions were crowned using a combination of dual-race wins and how the team fared at the conference meet. Leslie followed up its 5-0 record in duals with 36 points in the conference meet to cruise to first place. Hanover-Horton had 42 points to claim second on Wednesday, and overall after also going 5-0 in duals.
For the boys, it was Hanover-Horton and Leslie who both went 5-0 in dual meets, and neither came out on top on Wednesday. Jonesville, with Gavin VanKampen taking second and Caleb Blonde third, scored 49 points to take first with Hanover-Horton scoring 55 for second place and Leslie 100 points for third. That put the two Comets squads level for the overall title.
East Jackson’s Michael Allen was the champion for the boys as he ran away with the individual championship with a time of 16:40.
“I was just trying to win, I wasn’t worried about the time,” Allen said. “I knew I could because I had the fastest seed time coming in.
For the girls, it was Hanover-Horton’s Olivia Perrine who got to the front early on and kept building and building the lead as the race wore on. She finished in 19:41, more than 38 seconds in front of teammate Sophia Reynolds, who took second.
