Medical Lake cross country boys earn top-10 finish at Curtis Invite

By PAUL DELANEY

Staff Reporter

It's back on the road again this week for Medical Lake's cross country team when they head to compete at the Quincy Invitational at the Gorge Amphitheater in George, Wash.

Medical Lake is fresh off a solid performance at the Curtis Invitational in Tacoma where the boys' team, led by senior Jacob Morrison's 17-minute, 31-second time on the 5K course, finished eighth out of 19 teams with 266 points.

4A Puyallup won the team competition with 89 followed by Peninsula's 93.

Cardinals' coach Gene Blankenship said his team all had good times on the course.

“Nearly everyone had their best time of the season,” he added. Peter Loeffler (42nd overall) clocked an 18:13, Josh Stebbins (61st) an 18:37. Zeb Klemke (67th, 18:44) and Andrew Ryan's 19:42 in 101st rounded out the top finishers.

Amelia Cook's 21:50 paced the girls' finishers on the Titlow Park course finishing 29th overall. Kelby Wegner was second on the team and 43rd with a 22:28. Paige Propeck (24:45, 85th), Katy Savage (24:50, 88th) and Faith Schulte (25:14, 94th) were other top-5 finishers. As a team Medical Lake's girls wound up 14th out of 16 entries with 300 points in competition won by Peninsula.

In last Thursday's Great Northern League meet with Cheney and East Valley the Cardinal boys fell to Cheney 18-40 and East Valley 23-33. The girls lost to Cheney 15-48 and 21-36 to East Valley.

Again the top finishers on the boys' side were Morrison (seventh, 18:09), Loeffler (eighth, 18:23) and Stebbins (11th, 19:00). The girls' finishers also mirrored Tacoma with Cook eighth at 22:29, Wegner 12th at 23:25 and Propeck rounding out the top-3 with a time of 25:33, good for 14th.

Medical Lake returns to Great Northern League dual competition next Thursday, Oct. 14 for a home meet at the Fairways featuring Deer Park and Clarkston at 4 p.m.

In a fundraiser for the recent trip to Tacoma, Stebbins was the top finisher followed by Tanner Schultz and Jerome Morales as the team raised $4,000.

Paul Delaney can be reached at [email protected].