Medical Lake claims big victory at 1A districts
Medical Lake's Mason Williams shows pain on his face in the early going of last Thursday's District 7 1A cross country championships at Chewelah Golf and Country Club. Williams worked through it to finish fourth overall, right behind teammate Tyler Pena to lead the Cardinals to the title and a team berth at Saturday's state championships in Pasco where Medical Lake seeks its third championship in five years.
There are no bold predictions from head coach Gene Blankenship on chances the Medical Lake boy's cross country team will add a third state championship to the school's trophy case this Saturday.
Instead, Blankenship is traveling the safe path saying, "It's going to be between us, Meridian or Northwest," at Sun Willows Golf Course in Pasco for the 1A title. Meridian High is from Bellingham and Northwest is a private school near Seattle.
The girls race starts at 10:30 a.m. with the boys getting the starting gun at noon.
Medical Lake's boys became part of the conversation, as expected, when five runners finished in the top eight places and scored a dominant 28-43 win over Riverside in the District 7 championships Oct. 26 at Chewelah Golf and Country Club. The Cardinal girls were fifth with 102 points, well back of team champ Lakeside (46) and Colville (48).
"I wasn't expecting that, I figured Riverside would give us a run for our money," Blankenship said of the boys' victory.
While Riverside might have failed to present the type of challenge Blankenship expected, the individual champ, Ben Shaw, performed as expected, finishing in a time of 16 minutes, 19.54 seconds. Grant Avila from Deer Park was second (16:38.41) with the Cardinals' Tyler Pena just steps behind at 16:41.68.
"Tyler was right behind him, he just got outkicked," Blankenship said.
Mason Williams made a great recovery at the end, despite running in obvious pain, and finished fourth overall at 16:54.19.
"Mason's been hurting, he's had the same problem for three years," Blankenship said, not wishing to be specific what had the senior grimacing in the first mile or so. "It's a problem that just flares up," his coach added.
Williams is trying to take care of himself, but "He'll be ready (Saturday)," Blankenship said.
"We're going to run just great 1–3, (but) 4, 5 and 6 are going to make the difference who wins state," Blankenship said. "If that (4-6) group gets through the first mile in a reasonable time without killing themselves they could come out strong in the second mile," he explained of the strategy that will be used to elevate back to the top step on the Pasco podium.
Medical Lake won back-to-back titles in 2013 and 2014 and have been runners-up to Deer Park the past two years.
Maris Tuck, just a freshman, was 12th in a time of 20:40.11 and will qualify for state. Riverside's Lizzy Shaw won the girls' race in a time of 18:53.17. "That's kind of exciting," Blankenship said. Paige Headrick, also a freshman, finished 15th, but just 14 make it to state.
Headrick will get to tag along, however, giving her a feel for what the future might hold. And, albeit a very long shot, Headrick could run if someone in the group of 14 individuals from the Northeast A League contingent drops out.
"It would be an unusual situation," Blankenship said. Most were team finishers with not many individuals.
"My two assistants (Lisa Henry and Steve Warrington) have done a heck of a job with those girls," Blankenship said. "I think we're going to see more results out of our girls in the next couple of years."
Paul Delaney can be reached at pdelaney@cheneyfreepress.com.
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