Jake Beno, Anthony Zilla and Dan Werner will have entirely new roles for St. Charles East this season.
Four key members of the Saints’ back-to-back Class 3A team state qualifiers have graduated: Mike Gerkin, Mike Sciurba, Brett Izzo and Jack Rzpecki.
“They were the rock stars last year — at practice, at meets, you name it,” St. Charles East coach Chris Bosworth said of the quartet.
“There’s definitely a notice of who is gone,” Beno said.
Zilla, the lone returning member of the Saints’ top five at state, is undeterred.
“We might be even better this year than last year,” he said.
Beno has emerged as the face of the program for the Saints since last spring.
“What really flipped (for Beno) was last track season,” Bosworth said. “He is a tremendous competitor. He is in tremendous shape. He looks to be our No. 1 going into the season.”
Werner was the Saints’ seventh man at the Class 3A state meet in Peoria last fall. Bosworth will reload for another state run behind his returning seniors as well as Bennett Melone, Rohan Patel, Charles Murphy, Campbell Koch and Cole Adesso.
Bosworth noted that senior Chris Drage is a potential wild card for the Saints.
“Our main challenge is to have the juniors and sophomores make the transition to varsity,” Bosworth said. “We should be pretty good, but it might take some time to make that jump to varsity.”
Beno and Zilla are unconcerned about the new faces to the upper level of the program.
“I think we can step it up and be even better than last year if we all do our part,” Beno said.
“Every single guy (new to varsity) has been getting better,” Zilla said.
Beno has multiple goals for the season.
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“State is a totally different meet,” Beno said. “I learned you have to get out fast. If you don’t get out fast, everybody is going to be gone basically. If I do well at state individually, then it will correlate to a good team finish.”
Zilla also looks to lower his career-best time of 15:26 set at the state meet last fall.
“One of the biggest team goals is to be top 10, but for me, personally, I want to break 15 (minutes),” Zilla said.
Before the state series, however, the Saints share a common desire to earn an Upstate Eight River championship.
Bosworth said Geneva and Batavia would present the primary roadblocks to a league title becoming reality.
In Class 1A, Steven Bland will attempt to coach Harvest Christian to its fourth consecutive state appearance in the sixth year of the existence of the program.
Kevin McGavin is a freelance writer for The Courier-News.