By Kristi McDevitt
Sports Correspondent
The freshman and sophomore runners on the boys and girls cross country teams competed in the Rochester 9th/10th Grade Invitational last week.
The girls had three runners medal in the event: freshman Taylor Dewey 21:49/17th, freshman Danielle Kelley 22:05/24th, and sophomore Kelsea Schodowski 22:42/29th.
For the boys, sophomore Ben Cole 17:44/7th, and sophomore captain Adam Heskitt 17:59/10th also earned medals for their finishes at the invite.
Oxford headed into the homestretch last Saturday at Regionals, and the outcome would decide the fate of the teams ? continue the season at states, or end the season right then and there.
Unfortunately for both the boys and the girls, the 2005 season came to an abrupt end.
The boys placed 6th of 16 teams, but it wasn’t enough to advance. Senior Todd Davidson ran the race of his life, finishing 23rd in 17:02, setting a personal record (PR) in the last race of his high school career.
Other finishers for Oxford include: sophomore John Elin 17:28/37th PR, Ben Cole 17:31/42nd PR, senior captain Adam Richmond 17:30/40th, Adam Heskitt 17:33/44th, senior Mike Szabo 18:47/76th PR, and junior Greg White 18:52/79th PR.
The girls finished 13th out of 16 teams to end their season. ‘The girls were exceptional, but they were running against unbelievable competition,? noted head coach Ray Sutherland.
Freshman Taylor Dewey ran her fastest race of her career, 21:25 and finished 51st. Dewey also made the Top 15, a record book of past Ladycat runner’s fastest times. Her finish landed her 14th on the list.
Junior Abby Stewart 22:00/64th PR, junior Heather Nester 22:02/66th, Danielle Kelley 22:09/67th, Kelsea Schodowski 22:10/68th PR, junior Kayla Kolean 23:06/81st PR, and sophomore Ellen Darnall 23:11/82nd were the other finishers for Oxford.