It was a Twin Valley League showdown last week at the Onaga cross country with most of the TVL teams competing against each with a few other teams including another area team in Jackson Heights.

Highlighting the team performances in the action were the Wetmore Cardinal boys who took home first place as a team and the Washington County Tiger girls who took first in their competition. The rest of the top five for the boys teams finishes shook out with Washington County taking second, St. Mary’s Academy placing third, Rock Creek taking fourth and Onaga rounding out the top five taking fifth. On the girls side, it was Rock Creek taking home second place, Onaga finished third, Doniphan West registered a fourth place finish and Clifton-Clyde rounded out the top five with a fifth place finish.

Seven of the top 10 placer’s in the boy’s competition came from area schools and only one school was able to register multiple top 10 finishers. Washington County Tiger junior, Dylan Hodgson led the way individually taking home first place by nearly 28 seconds with a time of 17:04.46. Frankfort Wildcat senior, Adam Koch followed Hodgson taking home second place finishing as the only other boy to have an under 18 minute time on the day (17:32.36). Axtell senior, Tracy Schmitz and Valley Heights freshman, Adrian Pishny crossed the finish line next placing third (18:06.99) and fourth (18:32.42), respectively.

The Wetmore Cardinals and Onaga Buffalos each had a top 10 finish, also in the boys competition. Matter of fact for the Cardinals it was senior, Josh Ballenger and freshman, Aaron Achten both earning top 10 finishes placing seventh (19:05.22) and eighth (19:12.86). Onaga finished off the area top 10 performances on the boys side with Michael Eisenbarth taking ninth (19:13.45).

On the girls side of competition eight of the top 10 placer’s were from the area as spots three through 10 were grabbed by area runners. The highest finisher from the area came from the Jackson Heights Cobras junior, Kaitlynn Little who placed third behind a time of 17:43.71, less than a second behind second place. The Onaga Buffalos took home the next two spots in the top 10 as freshman, Maggie Revell and Alexis VanDonge placed fourth (18:24.68) and fifth (18:32.79), respectively and were the only girls team to registered multiple top 10 finishers.

It was Centralia, Axtell, Clifton-Clyde, Washington County and Doniphan West rounding out the top 10 in that order for the girls individual performances. Panther freshman, Sadie Jones took home sixth place (18:33.77), Tricia Schmitz of Axtell nabbed seventh (19:14.31) and Clifton-Clyde sophomore, Abby Sikes finished eighth (19:43.23). Washington Counties, Madison Stone and Doniphan West Mustang, Kassydi Miller rounded out the top 10 with ninth (19:46.26) and tenth (19:56.79) place finishes.

All the teams from the area shined on the day’s action with at least one top performance under their belt on the day action at Onaga. Teams and their runners now set their sights on building upon their performances moving forward.

Full 2013 Onaga Cross Country Invitational results -- click here