Boys are king of the hill

The Orange Coast League cross-country finals went pretty much as expected Nov. 2 on a hilly, dirt 5K (3.1 miles) course at Fairview Park in Costa Mesa.

In the boys’ race, Laguna earned the title of “kingpin” at not just the varsity level, but the junior varsity and frosh/soph levels, as well, as each captured championships.

In the girls’ race, Laguna placed second to Estancia.

BoysAt the varsity level, Laguna runners took five of the top 10 spots to earn all-league honors. Senior Jeremy Eaton is the boys’ new league champion after running to a first-place finish in 16:24. He was followed closely by senior teammate Andrew Raub who placed second at 16:26.

Junior Yann Panassie finished fourth (16:39), freshman Blake Hofmeister was seventh (17:01) and sophomore Casey Finnerty (17:21) rounded out the Laguna scorers with a 10th-place finish.

“We had a great league finals race,” Laguna Coach Dave Brobeck said. “We finished league with a 4-0 record. Estancia gave a very good race, but our experience and talent took over in the final mile and we ended up winning quite easily.”

In the junior varsity race, Laguna also took five of the top 10 spots with senior Corey Hedden (18:44) earning a second-place finish.

In the frosh/soph race, Laguna claimed seven of the top 10 spots, including the top five places to earn a perfect score for the team. Sophomore Rand Hardy (17:32) won the race with a time of 17:32. Brobeck said he asked Hardy after the race to be on the varsity CIF team as an alternate.

Laguna’s CIF team will run at 8:12 a.m. Saturday at the CIF-Southern Section Prelims Division IV race at Mount SAC in Walnut.

“In keeping with my patient approach, we will be training through this race once again this year, resting a few key runners and saving our best performances the following two final weekends at CIF finals and the California state meet,” Brobeck said.

“We hope to contend closely for CIF and State titles again this year.”

GirlsSenior Alex Crawley led a strong Laguna contingent by winning the race as Laguna finished with 28 points to place second to league champion Estancia.

Crawley captured the league crown in a time of 19:09. Melissa Lenker was the other Breakers runner to place in the top 10 as she finished in 20:26 to take eighth-place.

“It’s wonderful to see many of the girls continue to improve as we head into the CIF season,” Laguna Coach Earl Towner said. “Many girls ran course records as well as personal records.

“We’re at the part of our season when we race against schools from our own division. We run only with other teams within our school size.

“We had a fun year with the junior varsity girls and look forward to them running track and returning for next season of cross-country.”

Laguna will run in the first of three Division IV race heats of the CIF-SS Prelims at 8:50 a.m. Saturday at Mount SAC.

The top four teams from each race and the fastest team time from the remaining teams will race at the CIF finals Nov. 18th.