Whitefish girls dominate home meet
By DAVID ERICKSON / Whitefish Pilot
It was cold, clear and windy on Saturday as nine Lady Bulldogs placed in the top-10 at the Whitefish Invitational cross-country meet — including the first eight spots.
Drew Coco set a course record with his time of 15:27, and Loni Hanson paced the girls at 19:03. Five Whitefish girls placed under the 20-minute mark: Hanson, Jackie Cassidy, Jessica Sagen, Stella Holt and Bailey Eaton.
“We’ve been waiting for cooler weather, but this was a bit colder than we would have like,” head coach Bill Brist said. “It was cold but nice during the middle school race, but once the high school boys began to race, the cold breeze began to blow. It still turned into a good day for the Whitefish boys team. Drew would have liked to have run under 15 minutes, but the day just wasn’t quite right for that goal. Still, to have run nearly a half-minute faster than his winning time of last year was a great accomplishment.”
Patrick McGunagle put on a great effort as he set a new personal-best time of 17:08 for the three-mile course. He placed fourth overall.
“Pat looked really good today,” Brist said. “He held his race together pretty well. It was a much better run than his last meet at Thompson Falls. Anytime a person runs their best, it’s a good day.”
Perhaps the best performance from the boys side may have been that of Nathan Knox. He placed eighth with a personal best time of 18:07.
“Nathan has been a lot of fun to watch,” Brist said. “He has a great future ahead of him with distance running. You can just see it in his eyes as he races. He worked his way through the field and ran a fantastic race, finishing in the top-10 in a good field. Nathan shows us that the future of the Bulldog boys team should be fine in the years to come.”
Will Holhusen, Kaleb Prestegaard, Daniel Rivera and Dietrich Perchy all ran personal bests as well to round out the top-seven scorers for Whitefish.
“It was a really good day for the boys team,” Brist said. “Even though we finished second to a very good Columbia Falls team, we made nice strides to being a more competitive team for the upcoming championship meets that we have in front of us.”
For the girls, Loni Hanson repeated as the meet winner at 19:01. She was followed closely by teammates Jackie Cassidy (second at 19:10), and Jessica Sagen (third at 19:13).
“This was a great run by Loni,” Brist said. “She’s been looking at getting back to the front of our pack since the Mountain West race, and she had a great race to lead us once again. Jackie also had a great race with her new personal best time. She looked like she still had a lot left in the tank, so I think we’ll only see her get faster as the season continues. Jessica Sagen really put on a show today. This was a huge race for her. She’s been fighting a cold for the past couple of weeks, but she looked healthy today. This was a personal-best for her by almost 40 seconds. She runs through discomfort better than any runner I’ve worked with. She gave us an indication that she has some big things in front of her down the road.”
Whitefish will host the Class A divisional meet at Whitefish Lake Golf Course on Saturday, with the boys starting at 11 a.m. and the girls at 11:40 a.m.
Girls teams
1. Whitefish 15
2. Columbia Falls 50
Libby no score
Whitefish girls
1. Loni Hanson 19:03
2. Jackie Cassidy 19:10
3. Jessica Sagen 19:13
4. Stella Holt 19:27
5. Bailey Eaton 19:56
6. Natalie Kearns 20:38
7. Kelly Beiser 20:44
8. Beth Donovan 20:57
10. Hannah Weaver 20:09
15. Elizabeth Stevenson 21:52
16. Megan Shaver 22:00
18. Breanna Leggitt 22:04
20. Anne Miller 22:34
21. Nicole Birk 23:34
26. Katrina Brown 25:30
27. Simona Eicher 26:24
Boys teams
1. Columbia Falls 23
2. Whitefish 39
3. Libby 77
Whitefish boys
1. Drew Coco 15:27 (meet and course record)
4. Patrick McGunagle 17:08
8. Nathan Knox 18:07
15. Will Holdhusen 19:48
17. Kaleb Prestegaard 19:53
18. Daniel Riveria 20:00
20. Dietrich Perchy 20:18
23. Chris Reyna 21:32
24. Tucker Chambers 21:35
26. Matthew Kennedy 22:55
28. JJ Courtney 23:17
29. Ryan Rice 24:44