Varsity Insider

First meet of the year was yesterday. Although, as usual, only a small collection of teams ventured to Williams College in Massachusetts.

Most schools that competed were from the south, but scouring the results briefly it appears Essex, Rice and St. Johnsbury also sent a small contingent.

Here are the results.

Next meet at UVM this Saturday.

Mike Wood probably wishes he got paid for mileage in addition to the stipend he gets as head coach for the Rutland High boys basketball team.

His Raiders are taking frequent bus trips north early this season.  Rutland posted a win Monday at Rice Memorial in South Burlington.

Wood and company will be at the North-South Challenge on Friday night and Saturday afternoon at Burlington High and also includes Essex.

Rutland also is scheduled to be part of the Spaulding Holiday Tournament in Barre on both Dec. 17 and Dec. 19.  That also features Mount Mansfield Union.

And to wrap up his pre-Christmas travels, Wood will take his Raiders to St. Johnsbury on Dec. 23.   The final 12 games are against teams in the Marble Valley League, which covers the four most southern counties.

While chatting before the Rice game, Wood said he is trying to get his team tournament-ready and that means taking on some of the tougher teams. 

“We are on the road a lot to get those games,” said Wood about the northern trips.

Woods directed the Raiders to the semifinals last year and has most of his team back this year.  The biggest exception is the loss of Free Press second team all-state Mark Comstock to graduation.

 The Vermont Basketball Coaches Association ranked Rutland second in the pre-season poll, so things look good for at least one and maybe two more trips north for the Division I tournament in Burlington.

St. Johnsbury cross country runner Hayden Bunnell and Harwood’s Tim Shepard have had several battles this season. Shepard had the edge, SJA coach Chip Langmaid said, for a part of the season until last week.

Bunnell topped Shepard by a few seconds at U-32 last Tuesday. Over the weekend, Bunnell edged his rival again, this time at the Peoples Invitational. Except in this meet, Bunnell had more than just Shepard to contend with.

How about running over the half the race without a shoe? That’s exactly what Bunnell did, touring the 5K looped Morristown course in 17 minutes and 26 seconds — covering about two miles without a shoe.

So Bunnell braved the mud, roots, rocks and gravel, Langmaid said, to beat Shepard and his younger brother, Ben, despite risking injury. Talk about a gutsy and heady performance: No reported injury and, when he looped back around, picked up his shoe before completing the course.

And Hayden hasn’t missed a stride since, garnering another win Wednesday — with both running shoes.

For high school cross country, there’s only day that matters: the state meet.

While this year’s state championships are more than a month away — Oct. 31 at Thetford Academy — several teams and runners have shined brightly at a pair of early-season invitationals.

Let’s start with the girls:

Essex and CVU are the premier programs. Essex ended CVU’s 5-year reign atop D-I at last year’s state meet. So far in 2009, the programs each have victories at major meets (Essex and BHS invites).

At Burlington, Essex’s impressive pack running out-did CVU’s dependable strategy. The Hornets, led by freshman Rayna Dally, took places 7, 8, 9 and 12, 13. Summer Spillane and Adrienne Devita have been the Redhawks top runners.

Let’s rank them:
Teams:
1. Essex
2. CVU
3. South Burlington
Runners:
1. Hannah Rowe, St. Johnsbury
2. Emily Anderson, Middlebury
3. Jenna Griffith, Colchester

On the boys side, I don’t see much of a challenge for Essex in the D-I race.

Let’s rank them:
Teams:
1. Essex
2. South Burlington
3. Harwood
Runners:
1. Ben Lustgarten, BHS
2. Charlie Klilne, Essex
3. Nick Marshall, MMU

These rankings are subject to change. Give me your thoughts on some up-and-coming teams and runners, particularly in the smaller divisions.

Look ahead: The Manchester, N.H. invitational is Saturday, with Thetford’s Woods Trail Run the following weekend. Those meets bring a heap of talent from across the northeast. Of Vermont’s best, Rowe is the likely candidate to post a victory in one of the elite divisions over the next two weekends.

It’s probably too early to address any clear-cut favorites for cross country titles this fall, but I’ll give it a go:

Div. I girls
Essex and CVU: Essex ended CVU’s five-year reign in a stunner last year. Year in and year out, it’s CVU’s tremendous depth that is off the charts. Expect the same this year with the likes of Summer Spillane, Laura Jackson and Adrienne Devita and a host of well-tuned pack runners. Essex has plenty of returnees – except for last year’s No.1 runner Anna Guthrie. St. Johnsbury has the state’s best runner in Hannah Rowe.
Div. I boys
Essex? It’s tough to say — they return Charlie Kline and Edmo Gamelin and had a impressive JV squad — but lost some of its best runners to graduation after a championship season. CVU is always dangerous, and you never know down south — Brattleboro cooking anything up?

As for the Div. II boys and Div. II girls, the jury is still out. Although, Harwood boys probably are too deep to be dethroned. Burr and Burton girls won last year, and its always a numbers game down there: Will they have enough?

I’ll be at the Essex Invitational on Saturday, so the XC picture will, at least, start to come into focus.

Send me a line at aabrami@bfp.burlingtonfreepress.com or call me at 802-660-1848, with any tips or story ideas. Or just leave a comment on this blog on the area’s top runners/teams. We’d love to hear from you.