Roseville High's Boys' Cross Country Team Looks For Higher Finish in 2011

Though three of Roseville High School's top 10 boys' cross country runners have graduated, Raiders coach Brian Bailey expects his team to shoot even higher this season than last.

“They're coming off one of the best summers I have ever seen,” Bailey said of his runners. “They were running a lot and were in the weight room lifting regularly.”

Experience also helps as the Raiders return four senior captains in Sam Elfstrom, Sam Toso, Kevin Brooks and Shane Carlson. Lucas Osborn and Kyle Marshall also return as seniors for the Raiders.

“Most of the guys have experience from state now,” Elfstrom said.

A large group of juniors also return for the Raiders with Evan Kacmarynski, Tony Joyer, Lucas Mason, Hunter Larson, Matt Salvatore and Jacob Hasse. Bailey sees his team as 12 to 14 runners deep.

“Both our varsity and junior varsity will be pretty successful,” Bailey predicted. 

Seven runners get to run varsity at the meets, and the others will get to run junior varsity.

An early season meet on Thursday, Sept. 8 at Hopkins will indicate how successful this Raiders squad can be. They will be facing some of the top cross country teams in the state at the meet.

This season, Bailey wants his team to shoot for the top five in the state. The Raiders' conference will certainly prepare them to obtain such a goal as the Suburban East Conference (SEC)  has No. 1-ranked Stillwater and SEC teams Mounds View and White Bear Lake also made the preseason poll.

“We're going to be flying under the radar,” Carlson said. “We really like our position.”

The Raiders will see Stillwater for the first time on Saturday, Oct. 8 at the Alexandria Invitational.

In addition, the Raiders will take on the challenge of running in the Roy Griak Invitational at the University of Minnesota on Saturday, Sept. 24. The Griak Invite is regarded as the premier high school cross country meet in the nation.

“The Griak is not a whole lot different than state,” Elfstrom said. “There's fifty teams with 500 runners at the start.”

The Raiders began fall practice with their annual preseason training camp on Monday. Bailey took 20 runners down to Whitewater State Park for five days of running and team building. They will run the trails with runners from the White Bear Lake and Mounds View cross country teams.

“It's been a tradition for several years,” Bailey said. “We did it when I was a runner at White Bear Lake. When I took the Roseville job, I contacted the Roseville and Mounds View coaches to see if we could join them.”

The Raiders open their season on Friday, Aug. 26, at the Central Open at St. Catherine University.