Three Hereford girls finished in the top six at the Class 2A state cross country meet Saturday on their home course to lead the Bulls to their fourth championship in the past five years.
“We start every season like aiming to win a state championship and it doesn’t always happen, but it’s happened more than it hasn’t happened in recent years,” Hereford coach Adam Hittner said.
Coming off a runner-up finish last year, the Bulls did it with a new cast of talented harriers.
Sophomore Dempsey Nelson was third overall (20 minutes, 11 seconds) and junior Charlie Brill was fourth (20:11.05), while sophomore Kylie Jacobson, the Baltimore County champion, was sixth (20:32.56) behind Eastern Tech freshman Evette Otieno (fifth, 20:27.82).
“[Nelson, Brill and Jacobson] have been great for us all year,” Hittner said.
Brill was the only one who ran in the state meet last year when she finished 29th in 21:34.50.
Rounding out the top seven for the Bulls were senior Juliette Verderaime (30th, 22:27.57), and sophomores Brenna Hubbell (31st, 22:27.57), Isabella Messina (39th, 22:57.59) and Addison Abraskin (61st, 24:13.48).
“It’s a whole new team, but the expectations continue to be the same,” Hittner said. “That front three — Kylie and Dempsey have never run cross country before and behind them Brenna and Isabella were on JV for us last year and got some experience. And Addison didn’t have a great race because she has been fighting injury the last couple weeks, so she is fighting through it, but she was on JV last year and she was our third or fourth runner on our JV team and she was our fourth best runner most of this year.
“So these kids just like really grew like improved tremendously from ninth grade to 10th grade because they became full-time runners. They ran cross country, indoor track, outdoor track, they trained over the summer and they’ve really wanted to keep that legacy going.”
The Bulls finished with 62 points, ahead of second-place North Harford (81). The title was the seventh for Hittner and the 16th overall for the girls.
Patience was the key to the race for the top trio.
“They work together really well,” Hittner said. “For the first half of the race they started off a little further back because some of the early pace was pretty hot, they stayed back a little bit, but they were top 10 probably a half-mile or three-quarters of a mile in, and they just methodically worked their way forward and they just did a really nice job solidifying that front end for us and helping us get that team title.”
The race was won by Century’s Taylor Colson (19:10.64) and she was trailed by River Hill’s Alyssa Mattes (19:23.61). It was Colson’s second championship in three years, also winning as a freshman in 2023.
Last year, Hereford produced the second-place finisher in Sylvia Snider, but the runner-up team showing left it’s mark.
“All of us took it a little personally when we didn’t win last year. We like to win and even with Sylvia graduating and to lose a runner of Sylvia’s caliber at the front end and to then win a state championship the next year after having lost with Sylvia leading the charge, was a pretty remarkable turnaround,” Hittner said.
The Hereford girls weren’t the only Baltimore County girls making waves.
The finest performance came in the Class 1A race where senior Maren Blanks took the top prize with a personal record time of 20:31.38. Her teammates — Anna Bibo (sixth, 21:44.03), Cara Domsic (38th, 24:34.77), Mia Hager (42nd, 25:10.14) and Meara Parker (66th, 27:26.38) — helped them to fourth in the team race (130 points) won by Liberty (61).
In Class 4A, the Dulaney girls were sixth with 170 points in the meet won by Bethesda-Chevy Chase and BCC’s Nya Stoian (19:44.02).
Dulaney’s top seven included: Catherine Campbell (12th, 20:27.13), Nicole Lin (24th, 21:12.50), Kathryn Delaney (41st, 21:39.32), Alya Chawaf (54th, personal record 22:05.26), Nicole Valekha (62nd, 22:18.55), Chloe Preheim (73rd, 22:47) and Heidi Greten (87th, 23:20.05).
In the Class 3A girls race, the Towson girls were 17th with 408 points. Freshman Emalee Houston was 43rd (21:43.02). Catonsville didn’t field a complete squad, but they were led by senior Olivia Virago (32nd, 21:19.34).
Hereford boys are runners-up for first time since 2012
Hereford senior Eli Aitken took fourth place in the Class 2A boys race to lead the Bulls to second place with 110 points in the race won by River Hill (75). It’s the Bulls’ highest finish in 13 years.
“A very smart race which is what we talked about, just being under control, being calm and relaxed,” Hittner said. “He struggled at Bull Run, but he ran with so much more confidence and was so much more comfortable. He’s learned so much about cross country and I think he’s really excited that his races for the foreseeable future are going to be very flat and nothing but left turns.”
Aitken, the Baltimore County champion, negotiated the 5,000-meter course in 16:49.66. Hammond’s Trevor Miyagishma won in 16:37.52.
“We came into it knowing their was a four-team battle and I felt like River Hill was the favorite,” Hittner said. “We had seen Poolesville twice this year and we had seen Glenelg once and we hadn’t beaten neither of them but we were really close with them the last time and I felt like we had the possibility of winning, but River Hill ran better than I expected and they gave us no opportunity to try and chase them down. But we did really well to beat Glenelg and Poolesville to get that second-place finish which we were really proud of.”
Hereford’s squad included: James Wyatt (10th, 17:19.33), Katahdin McClure (24th, 17:46.90), Nate Berkowitz (39th, 18:26.34), Nick House (56th, 18:46.49), Tommy Hanlon (60th, 18:56.09) and Matthew Lowing (72nd, 19:12.08).
In the Class 3A race, the Baltimore County and regional champion Catonsville boys placed eighth with 247 points.
Senior Sebastian Wautel ran a personal best 17:42.76 and took 38th. Matt Foster was 39th (17:43.98), followed by Ever Fielding (49th, 17:51.83), Aidan Foster (79th, 18:23.18), Connor Bateman (82nd, 18:29.48), Oliver Graves-Abe (11th, 18:45.12) and Anderson King (155th, 20:27.25).
Towson’s 13th-place result was led by junior Andrew Robinson (46th, 17:46.88).
In the Class 4A boys race, Dulaney was seventh. They were led by senior Oliver Katz (17th, 17:17.15). Chris Martin (27th, 17:20.42), Luke Sales (51st, 17:58.17), Sean Lookingbill (53rd, 18:00.42), Cole Kardian (59th, 18:03.13), Bryce Mickles (73rd, 18:25.31) and Ethan Sappe (127th, 19:46.75) rounded out the squad.
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