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Sports

Local Cross Country Runners Advance to State Championship Meet

KP's Chris Allen wins boys Division 3 race.

It was another successful Divisional Championship meet for several members of the Hockomock League. Four teams along with three individuals ran well enough to win some hardware and qualify for next week’s All State Championship Meet.

Chris Allen of King Philip walked away with one of the best individual performances of the day with a first place finish in the boys Division 3 race. Leading for almost the entire race, the KP senior found himself alone on most of the 5K course en route to a 15:57 time. Allen now moves on to the boys Division 1 race at the All-State Championship meet where he expects to face tougher runners.

“Of all the races I’ve been at I’ve been leading. There are a lot of good guys in the state, so it will be nice to have people up front with me,” said Allen.

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Caroline Sun of Sharon qualified as an individual for next week’s race with a time of 19:42. The time was good enough for fourth place in the girls Division 3 race.

The team championship in the boys Division 3 race went to the Oliver Ames Tigers. Winning the team title for a second year in a row, the Tigers heavily relied on a fourth place finish from Drew Beck with a time of 16:26 and aggressive pack running. Jim Sullivan, Andrew Kerester, Dan Moverman, and Sean Gorham all finished between 17:15 and 17:18 to lock up the title.

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“The boys really set the tone for the day. They just ran so tremendously. We had six kids in before our closet competition had four,” said Oliver Ames coach Neil Levine.

The Tigers also earned a second place finish in the Girls’ Division 3 race. Shannon Hickey led the Tigers with a time of 19:53 that was good enough for sixth place overall. Maggie Harding, Megan Fitzgerald, Robin Loewald and Jillian McAuliffe all finished between 20:49 and 21:11 to continue the trend of tight pack running. The two big finishes from both teams sets Oliver Ames up for a couple of big races next week and potentially more hardware.

“We’re looking to improve obviously on our times that we ran today, improve on our pack running today, and just go out and search for that excellence,” said Levine.

In the Boys’ Division 2 race the Mansfield Hornets once again punched their ticket to the All State meet with a second place finish in the team results. Dan Caughey finished the couse in seventh place with a time of 16:50 while Brendan McCarthy finished in ninth place with a time of 17:01. Mitchell Negus finished in 12th place with a time of 17:04.

On the girls’ side, the Franklin Panthers finished in fourth in the team results of the Division 2 race to take the last team slot available in Division 2. Alexandria Giese led the way win a first place finish and a time of 19:14.

Foxborough’s Brendan Sullivan once again clinched a birth in next week’s state meet with a sixth place finish with a time of 16:21 in the Division 4 race. This will be Sullivan’s third appearance in the meet. Last year he finished fourth in the Division 2 race.

The Tigers, Panthers, and Hornets along with the individual qualifiers will face off once again at Franklin Park on November 19th in the MIAA All State Championship Meet. All the team qualifiers along with Allen and Sun will compete in the Division 1 race while Sullivan will be the soul representative from the Hockomock League in the Division 2 race.

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