Lambert’s balanced team finishes earn them the meet’s Top-award
Milton HS, 9/14/19
By Andy Carr
Eagle Cup Award
Forsyth County’s Lambert Longhorns (1st-11 pts) captured their first Eagle Cup at the 7th Milton Cross Country Invitational held on the Milton school campus course. The Longhorns balanced high team places over the six races contested help hold-off host Milton (2nd-9 pts) & South Forsyth (3rd-8 pts). Lambert started the day with a 5th place finish in the open girl’s race but then caught fire! The Longhorns won the boys open (1st-48 pts) to beat 8 schools, finished runner-up (2nd-55 pts) to Druid Hills varsity squad, won the boys JV race (1st-33 pts) over 15 schools (besting Druid Hills varsity squad), were 4th in the girls varsity race (4th-104 pts) besting10 schools & finished the day runners-up (2nd-83 pts), besting 15 schools, to secure the overall Eagle Cup trophy, a true full-team effort!
Varsity Girls
In a possible preview of the 7A state meet, ranked teams from Milton (1st-55 points), South Forsyth (2nd-67 pts) & Lambert (4th-104 pts) did battle on the extremely tough Milton school course with the host Lady Eagles besting the Eagles of South Forsyth for the first time in close to 2 years! Dunwoody (3rd-95 pts) held their own with the 7A squads and shows they will be right in the mix with the 6A teams come November. Out the gate, Atlanta International’s junior Reagan Mahoney (1st-20:41) built a sizable lead after the first 1000-meter loop. Milton’s senior Nyah Hernandez (2nd-21:00) used her knowledge of the course and after 3000 meters, was in front but as the course wound its way through the woods loop, Mahoney recovered and re-took the lead with 300 meters to go and pulled away for the overall victory. Hernandez settled for runner-up honors with her 15-second course personal best which put her the 5th best Milton runner on her home course. Atlanta International’s senior Cara Joyce (3rd-21:11) came out on top for the 3rd spot in a close battle with Janie Sandel (4th-21:11) of Johnson Ferry Christian. Rounding out the top-5 was the junior from Milton Audrey Nichols (5th-21:44) who’s performance was a 46-second personal best on the course.
Varsity Boys
South Forsyth (1st-47 pts) showed they are not messing around and that they are ready to defend their state championship come November with a dominating team win over 16 scoring schools. With their top-6 in the top-16 finishing positions, the Eagles had 6 finishers ahead of every team’s 4th finisher. Lambert’s (2nd-83 pts) runner-up finish, without top-runner Cooper Bocko, secured their Eagle Cup win but also outdistanced region & area rival host Milton (3rd-96 pts) and 4A’s Denmark (4th-105 pts) Danes. Loganville (5th-115 pts) was in the mix most of the race as well. The race for the top-spot was conservative early as a very large pack of about 20 runners made it to 2000 meters together before Loganville’s Tesfaye Athanasius (10th-18:11) made a bold move to break up the group and was leading through 2 miles before the real racing started! South Forsyth’s Brennan Bower (1st-17:27) steadily pulled away in the last 1000 meters to eventually run the 11th best performance on the course to get the overall win. The racing behind him was furious & fast as the 2nd through 7th spots changed multiple times in the last 200 meters as Milton’s senior co-captain Spencer Watry (2nd-17:45) put on an outrageous finishing kick to move from 7th to 2nd in one of the races closest finishes! Habersham Central’s Thomas Hotard (3rd-17:45) just edged out Lambert’s Colin Chapman (4th-17:46) & Ethan Ashley (5th-17:47) of Denmark & junior Hayden Marshall (6th-17:48) of Milton as Michael Patterson (7th-17:52) of South Forsyth was at the back end of this front group.
JV Girls
Druid Hills (1st-41 pts) ran their varsity squad down and secured the top-spot as the Longhorns of Lambert (2nd-55 pts) & Milton (3rd-109 pts) followed. 12 complete teams scored. Claire Shelton (1st-21:54) of Dunwoody took the lead after the first 1000 meter loop to get the overall win, the 3rd overall race win over the last 2 weeks for Shelton.
JV Boys
Lambert (1st-33 pts) showed their boys depth by besting 15 schools to get the team win which included besting Druid Hills (2nd43 pts) varsity squad. The Red Devils were led by Mike Rosenbluth (1st-18:44) who led the race wire-to-wire for a 23-second race victory.
Open Girls
The Lady Eagles of Milton (1st-15 pts) through down a perfect score (the school’s 8th perfect score ever) to start the meet off in the day’s first race while besting 5 scoring programs. Milton senior Quinn Swidorski (1st-25:29) ran her 8th race on her home course and was the clear winner by close to 30 seconds!
Open Boys
Lambert (1st-38 pts) started their big day with a 10-point victory over Pope (2nd-48 pts) & 7 more scoring schools. Siddhartha Narker (1st-20:01) of Druid Hills led from the gun and got the race win by 39 seconds.
