Ronan girls take first at Hamilton Invite

HAMILTON — With 47 points Ronan girls cross country found themselves racing to first place at the Hamilton Invite last weekend, and the boys finished third as the teams will look to compete in Polson this weekend.

The girls left Whitefish, Polson, Lincoln, Dillon, Frenchtown, Hamilton, C-Falls and Anaconda in their dust. And while the girls have shown improvement throughout the season, head coach Gale Decker has more benchmarks for them to meet.

"We need to cut just a few more seconds off of the times of our four, five and six girls by the end of the season," he said. "They've continued to improve as the season progresses and we're expecting better times out of them. I have no doubt that we can put our top six girls under the 21 minute barrier by the end of the season and possibly under 20:30."

The boys ran respectively as well, finishing third with 96 points behind Dillon with 73 points.

"In the boys' division our first four boys ran well again and Justin Grandon continues to improve his time in the number five spot," he said.

Grandon finished 57th with 18:53.

Decker commented on Cameron Barber saying that he will be an asset to the team and will cut the team's score significantly. Also, Buddy Cheff and Erick Stedje are showing improvements and he hopes to see them finishing under 17 minutes the rest of the season.

"Both of them have worked extremely hard in practice to cut time," he said.

Saturday, Ronan will be at the Polson Invite.

Results

Varsity girls

Team scores: Ronan 47; Whitefish 98: Polson 113; Lincoln 123; Dillon 127; Frenchtown 129; Hamilton 133; C-Falls 197; Anaconda 242.

Individual girls: Terinee McCready, 3rd, 18:25; Sadie McMillan 5th, 19:52; Kaneesha Benson 7th, 20:19; Briana Malmquist 14th, 20:58; Christa Salomon 18th, 21:14; Kelsey Salomon 25th, 21:37; Ali Anderson 52nd, 23:20; Britney Maddox 54th, 23:37.

Varsity boys

Team scores: Hamilton 69; Dillon 73: Ronan 96; Frenchtown 142; CFalls 145; Polson 153; Darby 176; Whitefish 202; Anaconda 207; Corvallis 223; Arlee 301.

Individual boys: Michael Fisher 1st 16:00; Andrew Graham 9th, 16:59; Buddy Cheff 14th 17:06; Erick Stedje 17:07; Justin Grandon 57th 18:53; Levi Maughan 71st 20:05.