Houston teams were dominant at the South Central Association conference championships cross country meet Monday at Willow Springs Municipal Golf Course.
With a team score of 42 points, the Houston High School boys won the conference championship for the second straight season, taking three of the top-10 spots in the race.
Junior Jack Sawyer paced the Tigers and earned First-Team All-SCA honors by finishing 5th in a field of 36 runners with a time of 18:46.44 on the 3.1-mile course. Two HHS athletes earned Second-Team All-SCA by placing in the top-10, as junior Warren Hinkle came in 8th at 19:27.41 and senior Riley Talbott finished 9th at 19:33.62.
Rounding out the Tigers’ team score and receiving All-SCA Honorable Mention were senior Connor McKinney in 14th and junior Jackson Evetts in 15th. HHS freshman Christopher Meier was right behind Evetts in 16th, while freshman Gage Smith placed 26th.
Ava took second in the team standings with 46 points and Mountain Grove was third with 75. Ava junior Isaac Smith won the boys race with a time of 17:17.0, while Salem senior Alex Diehl took second at 17:32.50 and Willow Springs sophomore Joel Smith came in third at 18:02.66.
On the girls side, HHS senior Kristen Ely won the individual SCA crown by placing first in a field of 24 with a time of 21:54.41. Next across the finish line for the Lady Tigers was freshman Jessyn Allen in third at 23:11.75, while junior Lilly Kincaid came in 11th, junior Natalie Clinton placed 15th and senior Allie Benoist finished 17th.
Ely and Allen earned First-Team All-SCA recognition, while Kincaid and Clinton received Honorable Mention.
The Lady Tigers topped Salem in the team standings. Since only two squads produced 5-runner scores, there was no official team conference champion.
In middle school racing, Houston’s girls swept the top-3 spots in a 20-runner field.
HMS 7th-grader Myles Copley won the race with a time of 9:45.90 on the 2,500-meter course, while 8th-grader Lyla Huffman ran second at 10:04.31 and 6th-grader Hayden Jones came in third at 11:22.72 (a personal-record time by 5 seconds). Also finishing for the Lady Tigers were 7th grader Hadlie Miller in ninth, 8th-grader Savannah Evetts in 10th and 6th-grader Keira Kelly in 13th (with a PR of 12:51.28, a 6-second improvement over her previous best time).
Houston was the only squad to produce a 5-runner team score.
The HMS boys placed second among five teams with scores, behind only Thayer.
Houston 7th-grader Oliver Choate won the boys race with a time of 9:04.32, while 7th-grader Charlie Benoist took third at 9:32.97. HMS 7th-grader Liam Stickel posted a top-10 finish by placing 8th at 9:53.68, while 6th-graders Rocky Gilbert and Easton Hinkle contributed to the team score by coming in 15th and 16th, respectively.
The win was Choate’s sixth in seven outings this season.
Houston athletes will run again on Thursday of this week in a big meet at Clever and on Monday of next week at Fordland.
The Missouri Middle School State Championships are set for Oct. 26 at Wheatland.
The two HHS squads will compete at the Class 3 District 2 Championships Nov. 2 at Plato, and the State Championships are set for Nov. 8 in Columbia.
