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player ready...Playing “under the lights” connotes a big game for any high school athlete. It’s usually associated with football. But cross-country, not so much.
That Friday Night Lights atmosphere was evident at Neuqua Valley High School last week at the annual Naperville Twilight Invitational, which dubs itself as the only after-dark, on-campus high school cross-country meet in the country. All of the Naperville public high schools competed.
Neuqua Valley junior Connor Horn, who missed last cross-country season due to injury, continued his impressive comeback with the overall victory, completing the 2.85-mile course in 14:31. He edged out his teammate, senior Michael Widmann (14:33), in a sprint to the finish. Naperville North senior Jonathan Klaiber finished third in 14:37.
The top two spots helped give Neuqua Valley the overall victory in the boys’ race with 28 points. Naperville North finished second with 46 and Naperville Central finished third with 63.
Horn ran with a pretty big pack through the first two miles of the race before he and Widmann made a move. Only Klaiber was able to go with them, and they eventually pulled away from him.
“That was the plan going in,” Horn said. “The North and Central guys were with us, and then Michael and I decided to go for it to see if we could hold on. Mike had a great race.”
Also scoring for Neuqua Valley were senior Daniel Weiss in fourth place (14:43), junior Dominic Dina in 10th place (15:01) and junior Matthew Horsley in 11th place (15:01.4).
Horn was happy with his results, although he still feels he’s working to get back into peak shape.
“I’m (running) pretty well, but I think I’m still building,” he said. “We’re going to keep training and hopefully we’ll be able to peak at the state meet. But I think we should be happy with how we’ve been racing.”
Naperville North was paced by five seniors. After Klaiber, scoring for Naperville North were Kerry Gschwendtner in fifth (14:43), Andrew Ladeur in seventh (14:53.7), Christian Moore in 14th (15:02) and Ryan Drendel in 17th place (15:11).
Naperville Central was led by junior Geoffrey McCullough, who finished sixth overall in 14:50. He was followed by senior Scott Hicks in eighth (14:54), junior John Manos in 15th (15:06), senior David Kennedy in 16th (15:07) and sophomore Thomas Chavez in 18th (15:21).
Minooka High School finished fourth overall with 109 points, followed by Metea Valley in fifth (157) and Waubonsie Valley in sixth (162).
The girls’ meet saw a rarity in cross-country — Minooka varsity runners finished the meet one, two, three, and yet didn’t win the overall title. That went to Naperville North, which managed to overcome Minooka’s dominance by placing its runners in an impressive pack that finished in fourth, fifth, seventh, eighth and ninth, giving them a total of 33 points.
Minooka finished second with 53 points, but the future looks extremely bright. Sophomore Ashley Tutt took the overall victory in 16:40, followed by sophomore Mackenzie Callahan (16:55.3) and freshman Emily Shelton (16:55.7). The three led practically the whole race, gradually growing a gap between themselves and the sea of orange that was Naperville North.
“We were a little surprised (to be out in front),” Tutt said. “But we just all worked together. … It was great to finish together like this.”
Naperville North senior Elly DeTurris led the Huskies, finishing in fourth place in 17:11. She was followed by sophomore Claire Hamilton in fifth (17:14), junior Judy Pendergast in seventh (17:22.5), freshman Sarah Schmitt in eighth (17:22.9) and junior Jennifer Gibson in ninth (17:31.8).
“Running a progressive race was really something that our whole team wanted to focus on today,” DeTurris said. “We really pushed ourselves as a team going out there to do the best that we could.”
Neuqua Valley finished third overall with 77 points, just edging out Naperville Central in fourth with 80. Caitlin Horn led the Wildcats with a 10th place finish in 17:33, followed by senior Anastasia Bernat in 11th (17:36), junior Julia Pena in 15th (17:40), senior Lauren Penkala in 18th (17:56) and freshman Corinna Pena in 23rd (18:06).
Naperville Central sophomore Alana Austin finished sixth overall in 187:17 to lead the Redhawks. She was followed by junior Maggie McClowry in 16th place (17:44), sophomore Carolyn Carpenter in 17th place (17:46), and two freshmen, Erin McHugh in 20th (18:00) and Meghan Donovan in 21st (18:04).
In the girls’ varsity race, Waubonsie Valley finished fifth with 128 points.
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Next up for Naperville North and Central will be the DuPage Valley Conference championships on Oct. 16 for girls and Oct. 17 for boys. Neuqua Valley, Metea Valley and Waubonsie Valley will be competing in the Upstate Eight Conference Championships for both boys and girls on Oct. 18.