Even through mud and rough footing, Manhattan High\u2019s cross country teams delivered another dominant league performance Saturday at Peter Pan Park.<\/p>\n
The top-ranked girls team in Class 6A put together a rare feat \u2014 a perfect score of 15 \u2014 to claim the Centennial League championship. Junior Gabrielle Converse captured the individual crown in 18:37.6, followed by freshmen Zara Koehn (18:53.7) and Isla Spreer (19:00.8), sophomore Andie Strathman (19:53.5) and junior Scarlett Williams (19:58.4). It marked what coach Susan Melgares said was the first perfect score in league history, or at least since 2004.<\/p>\n
Freshman Allison Knopp (7th, 20:01.8) and sophomore Valeria Villoria (15th, 20:52.8) also contributed strong finishes as Manhattan beat runner-up Washburn Rural (49) by more than 30 points. The JV girls followed with a sweep of their own, taking the first 11 places \u2014 14 of the top 15 overall \u2014 to complete a clean sweep across divisions.<\/p>\n
The MHS boys, currently ranked No. 4 in 6A, placed third with 49 points in a razor-thin team race behind Washburn Rural (31) and Junction City (48). Seniors Wilson Wesch (8th, 17:17.0), Jaxon Wheeler (9th, 17:19.2), Patrick Huser (10th, 17:24.7), Will Richards (11th, 17:25.6) and Benjamin Huser (12th, 17:25.6) all finished within eight seconds of each other, reinforcing the team\u2019s trademark pack-running depth.<\/p>\n
Freshman Levi Gurgel (16th, 17:33.6) and sophomore Kyler Grogg (18th, 17:46.8) rounded out the top seven.<\/p>\n
Manhattan will turn its focus toward the 6A regional championships, where both squads will aim to extend their success and secure state berths.<\/p>\n
Wamego sweeps NCKL<\/p>\n
At the North Central Kansas League meet in Wamego, the host Red Raiders swept both team titles in convincing fashion.<\/p>\n
The Wamego boys dominated the field with just 19 points, led by senior Peyton Parker\u2019s winning time of 17:00.49. Senior Isaac Ibendahl (2nd, 17:12), junior Logyn Evans (3rd, 17:23), senior Emil Wolfe (7th, 17:53) and senior James Bearman (8th, 17:57) secured a commanding 56-second spread among the top five.<\/p>\n
Rock Creek finished runner-up with 71 points behind sophomore Liam Johnston (5th, 17:30) and senior Simeon Bohlen (9th, 18:01). Freshman Coltrane Johnston (13th, 18:34), junior Dylan Nelson (24th, 19:22) and senior Mason Berggren (25th, 19:32) rounded out the scoring group.<\/p>\n
The Wamego girls completed the sweep with 25 points and a 21:15 team average. Junior Shayne Pittenger-Reed won the individual title in 20:09, with senior Elsie Rickstrew (3rd, 20:16) and freshman Colleen Murphy (5th, 21:18) joining her in the top five. Sophomore Caroline Brethour (11th, 22:07) and freshman Zulia Wells (14th, 22:26) completed the scoring.<\/p>\n
Rock Creek\u2019s Livia Nippert added a top-five medal, placing fourth in 20:40, while Lucia Nippert finished eighth in 21:36 to help pace the Mustangs.<\/p>\n
Council Grove notches 3rd<\/p>\n
At the Flint Hills League Championships in Council Grove, the Braves hosted seven schools Thursday at Canning Creek Cove as the boys’ team finished third.<\/p>\n
In the boys\u2019 race, Jadyn Picolet earned league runner-up honors in 17:25, while Brody Nelson (14th, 19:27) and Carter Bremer (16th, 19:34) also placed inside the top 20. Nelson\u2019s finish earned him all-league recognition, and Picolet\u2019s time solidified his second-place position after a late surge behind champion Caul Johns of West Franklin.<\/p>\n
Three Braves \u2014 freshmen Aaron Crotts and Ronnie Mayer and junior Savannah Johnson \u2014 ran personal bests, while Hayden Horton recorded a season-best 19:55. The Braves finished third as a team in a tightly contested field.<\/p>\n
Council Grove will next travel to Wichita Trinity for regionals on Oct. 25.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Even through mud and rough footing, Manhattan High\u2019s cross country teams delivered another dominant league performance Saturday at…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":9454,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[7971,75,84,83,4504,9,24,63,319],"class_list":{"0":"post-9453","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-manhattan","8":"tag-area_sports","9":"tag-manhattan","10":"tag-manhattan-headlines","11":"tag-manhattan-news","12":"tag-manhattan_high","13":"tag-new-york","14":"tag-new-york-city","15":"tag-nyc","16":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9453","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9453"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9453\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9454"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9453"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9453"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9453"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}