Glenwood City girls head back to state XC with runner up finish, boys place seventh at Boyceville sectional

Although the Glenwood City girls, after winning a sectional championship a year ago, knew it would be a little tougher this year to qualify for the WIAA state cross country meet, they won the battle for second place in the team standings at the Boyceville sectional meet Oct. 24. By finishing as the runner up behind Dunn-St. Croix Conference rival Colfax, they qualified for their second consecutive trip to The Ridges Course in Wisconsin Rapids at noon this Saturday. The boys’ team moved up from tenth place a year ago to finish seventh this year.

Morgan Kadinger was the first Topper girl to finish in tenth for the team points with a time of 21:26, while Taylor Drinkman, returning a month ago after recovering from ACL surgery was a spot behind in 21:28. Makayla O’ Brien hung with her teammates and was 13th in team points at 21:39 and Kaylie Scalze was 19th in 22:23. Elizabeth Wink followed in 24th at 23:02, Maya Petersen finished 30th at 23:34 and Macie Rasmussen was 39th in 23:56. With 97 individuals competing, the race was won by fellow D-SC sophomore Kassye Todd from Elmwood-Plum City in 19:58.

“This was only Taylor’s fifth race of the season and it is good to get her back,” Topper coach Matt Schutz said. “She proved she is a state runner by her hard work but all seven of our girls stepped up. We knew Colfax pretty much had first place wrapped up and we had maybe seven teams we had to beat for second place. Our girls said they wanted to get back to state and their effort made it happen,” he added.

The boys were led by senior Jack Kremer in 25th place overall in 18:45, followed by Riley Schutz in 28th at 18:54. Next in line for 41st place was Owen Wagner at 19:36 while Andrew Bauman was 44th in 19:41, Matthew Bauman was 47th at 19:45.6, Jacob Nadeau was on his heels for 48th place at 19:45.8, and Corey Klatt came in for 77th place in 20:39. There were 122 individuals in the contest with Immanuel Lutheran’s Dan Lau winning it at 16:59.

“We thought our boys ran well and could maybe finish in the top five for the team race,” Schutz said. “But we had a nice finish after being near the cellar the last few years.”