Good Day for North Stars Runners

Coach Kevin Harrington wasn't expecting a title-winning performance from his St. Charles North boys cross country team during Saturday's season-opening St. Charles East/Jeff Leavey Invitational.

But that's exactly what he got.

Fueled by a 47-second split from its first through fifth runners, the North Stars emerged as the team champions, edging Prairie Ridge by six points, 78-84.

"Some of our former runners were here and they told me afterward that it looked like we had around 78 points, which is pretty good," Harrington said. "But we've got five new kids on varsity (out of the starting seven).

"Our whole goal was just to pack it up. If we ended up scoring well that's fine but we were much more concerned with running as a team today. All in all, I think we did a pretty good job."

Junior Billy Clink led the way into the chute, covering the 3-mile LeRoy Oakes Forest Preserve course in a fourth-place time of 15:28.2, more than 30 seconds faster than his clocking from the state meet last November.

"I never thought about time," Clink said. "I was going after places to help out my team."

Ryan Senci (7th, 15:35.3), Declan Duggan (12th, 15:44.5), Zachary Heuer (26th, 16:07.1), Grant Markowicz (29th, 16:15.2), Clayton Schmitt (62nd, 16:51.6) and Graham Bultema (86th, 17:16.4) also chipped in for St. Charles North.

On the girls' side, junior Sydney Stuenkel enjoyed her return to the sport after taking a year off to concentrate on soccer, finishing 11th for the fifth-place North Stars (169 points). Her 3-mile time was 18:25.1.

"She ran a faster time than her whole freshman year so I'm very happy," said St. Charles North girls coach Shari Hayes.

"Maybe it was a good thing for her (not to run cross country last season) because she has come back a different runner."

Senior Erica Bauerbach (29th, 19:10.6), junior Anna Gawlik (32nd, 19:24.0), freshmen Kaylee Wessel (47th, 19:52.7), Ashley England (57th, 20:08.7), and sophomores Audrey White (61st, 20:13.7) and Megan Young (63rd, 20:18.4) completed the North Stars' lineup.

"I wasn't going to run the younger girls today but they really wanted to so I figured let's see what we have," Hayes said.

For complete results of todays invitational, visit www.realtiminginc.com.