Cross country reaches season’s final 5K

The Powell Panther cross country teams will line up for the final race of the year this Saturday when the teams compete at the Douglas Country Club for the 3A state championship title.

The Panther boys will begin the day’s multiple races at 10:30 a.m. Powell’s girls depart the starting chute at noon for their championship race. Both teams have some ground to make up if they want to return home with hardware.

For the Panther boys, it is a familiar position. The team enters the state race coming off a fifth-place finish at the conference meet last week. Last year, the Panthers followed up a fifth-place conference finish with a shocking third-place finish at the state meet.

While nobody is suggesting that lightning might strike a second time, that performance has been mentioned more than once this week as evidence that conference meet results can’t simply be assumed to be a pre-cursor to the state meet.

One Panther hoping his conference performance is a harbinger of things to come this weekend is junior Andrew Feller. Feller broke to the front of the pack early at the conference meet and held on for the full five kilometers to finish in third place with a sub-17 minute time.

“He’s been so consistent throughout the season,” Panther cross country coach Cliff Boos said after that meet. “He just gets out there and runs with a determination that’s been fun to watch.”

A similar performance on Saturday could see the junior return with all-state honors to his credit.

On the girls’ side, the question is whether or not the Panthers will continue their run of state hardware. The defending state champions have brought team hardware home from the state meet for five consecutive years, but have their work cut out for them.

The arrival of Star Valley and the creation of a full team of runners in Cody has created a significant change to the 3A cross country landscape. Throw in an always-tough Jackson squad and the Panthers’ recent fourth-place finish at the 3A West conference meet really doesn’t look that shabby.

Nonetheless, it means improvement will be required if the team is going to extend its trophy haul into a sixth year.

“It will be a completely different field,” Boos said. “You get those runners in from the east side of the state and it shakes everything up. Last year we were eight points behind Jackson and went down to Douglas and wound up winning by a bunch.”

This year, the Panthers head to Douglas having trailed Jackson by just four points at the conference meet. Star Valley and Cody were each 30 points better than the Panthers last weekend and many expect the 3A West schools to rise to the surface as the cream of the crop in Douglas.

Desiree Murray is a two-time all-state runner looking to close out her cross country career in style. Sierra Morrow and Tally Wells each scored all-conference honors in the 3A West race last week.

The Panthers leave Friday morning for Douglas. They’ll spend the afternoon examining the state course prior to the start of the championship races on Saturday.