The girls’ and boys’ varsity cross country teams travelled to Carrollton, Ga., on Nov. 1 to compete with the best running teams in the state. 

After a great first season with new coach Matt McMurray ‘12, the girls Junior Varsity and Varsity teams both went undefeated in the state of Georgia, and the boys also had a competitive season.

On Oct. 19, the teams competed on their home turf for the Region 4A meet. The girls ran well and came in 1st place, while the boys fought hard and placed 4th overall. In a shining moment, 8th grader Ruby Little ran her best 5k at just over 19 minutes.

With the region meet finished, the girls’ and boys’ teams started prepping hard for the state cross country meet. For the two weeks before state, the runners logged many miles, ran tough workouts, and all came together in a team spirit.

The girls team is the best team in Marist history. All top seven runners have a personal record of under 19 minutes, which, until now, was unprecedented. At one point in the season, the girls were ranked as the 20th best team in the country.

The boys’ team was quite young this year, with only one senior, Lucas Gonzalez, in the top seven. However, despite being in rebuilding mode, they had notable performances throughout the year. At the region 4A meet, the team placed 8th out of 32 teams, with Diego Palmisano, Jaylen Mallett, Jack Lloyd, Grant Gaffney, Lucas Gonzalez, Caden Strickland, and Charlie Kirk finishing in that order.

On the other hand, the girls were predicted to sweep after winning every meet thus far in Georgia. The girls ran incredibly hard with a finishing order of Kathleen Schellman, who earned All-State Honors, Nora Solomon, Emily Little, Sofia Laskowski, Emma McEvoy, Nicole Pizzo, and Lucy-Jewell Watson.

The girls ended up placing 3rd out of 32 teams behind 1st and 2nd place teams St. Pius and Blessed Trinity, respectively.

Althouh it was a disappointing state race, the Marist Girls Cross Country Team is not going out without a bang. The top 7 runners headed up to North Carolina to compete at the Nike Cross Regionals, hoping to secure a spot to compete at nationals.