Mount cross country cruising past league rivals

by Tom Utescher
Posted 11/3/20

With a comfortable victory in an Athletic Association of Catholic Academies tri-meet last Wednesday, host Mount St. Joseph raised its record in cross country competition to 5-0.

Facing two of the …

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Mount cross country cruising past league rivals

Posted

With a comfortable victory in an Athletic Association of Catholic Academies tri-meet last Wednesday, host Mount St. Joseph raised its record in cross country competition to 5-0.

Facing two of the smaller schools in the league, the Magic topped St. Basil Academy, 18-45, and overcame Sacred Heart Academy, 50-15. Earlier in the season, the Mount defeated Villa Joseph Marie, Gwynedd Mercy, and Merion Mercy.

The PIAA District 1 championships had originally been scheduled for last Wednesday afternoon, but the meet was pushed back a few days. With that big race coming up shortly, MSJ coach Kitty McClernand did not have her varsity athletes go all out in Wednesday's league tri-meet, and instead had them run alongside some of their other teammates.

All alone by the end of the race, Magic junior Mary McGrory won in a time of 21 minutes, 15 seconds, ahead of senior teammate Alex Westawski (22:12) and St. Basil's junior Cate Noelle Quinn, who was third in 22:15.

After another gap, two Mount runners finished together, sophomore Maggie Murphy (normally the team's number one runner) in 22:52 and senior Emily Carr one second behind.

This was just the leading edge of a wave of Mounties that would cross the line to capture the rest of the places in the top 10. Clocking in close together in sixth through eighth place were juniors Olivia Forti (23:16), Carolyn Arnold (23:20), and Sarah Hughes (23:22). Senior Lexi Weeks was not far behind (ninth in 23:24), and rounding out the top 10 was freshman Constance Huber (23:49).

Sacred Heart then had its first two runners finish together, with junior Kathryn Gallagher coming in at 23:58, just one second ahead of 12th-place Makenzie Fisher, a freshman.

A Mountie trio followed, with junior Liz Dolich placing 13th in 24:05, closely followed by seniors Annie Lemelin (14th) and Danyele Murtha (15th), who were both timed at 24:06.

Next came a pair of visiting freshmen, Paige Tavares of St. Basil (16th; 24:15) and Katie Schanne of Sacred Heart (17th; 24:29). Coming in 18th, St. Basil's Samantha Sonnie (24:37) preceded fellow juniors who were running for the Mount, Lauren Maher (19th; 24:41) and Kathleen Downs (20th; 24:48).

This season's strange schedule has the Mount slated to run its last several league opponents after the District 1 meet, and the AACA championships won't take place until November 17.