South Thurston County put on a show at Lewis River Golf Course in Woodland on Thursday afternoon with the Beavers and Thunderbirds peaking at the right time.
For the second straight season, Tumwater will make the trek to the state meet in Pasco as a team after piling up 102 points to take third place amongst its Class 2A District 4 foes. And for the second time in three years, Tenino will have its team at state after a fourth place finish with 137 points in the 1A portion of the meet.
Tumwater saw all of its low-five be inside the top-40, paced by sophomore Tyler Clark’s third place performance in 16 minutes, 51 seconds. Although his time was a touch slower than last fall, Clark was nine spots better this time around. Landon Martin was 10th in 17:35 and James Smith also ran sub-18 to place 22nd.
Hayden Newman (35th) and Will Zahn (36th) rounded out the scoring five for the T-Birds. Elsewhere in the 2A race, three individuals placed in the top-28 to nab state berths, all for the first time in their prep careers.
Centralia’s Ethan Weiher took eighth in 17:27 while W.F. West’s Connor Clary was 12th and Black Hills’ Seth Thomasson placed 15th, both under 17:45.
Tenino, a week after clipping Elma in the Evergreen League meet, did the same on Thursday by a 20-point margin. Darien Nelson and Nathan Pye, the Beavers’ fourth and fifth runners, placed better than the Eagles’ Nos. 4 and 5 runners, which only aided the performance.
Porter Mowry continued to lead the way for the Beavers with a ninth place finish in 18:04 and Weston Frank registered a 17th place finish in 18:41. Josiah Marzolf, Nelson and Pye all crossed the finish line in the top-50.
Also in the 1A race, Rochester’s Kian Christiansen qualified for the state meet for the second year in a row, running 18:44 to place 19th.
On the girls side, while no 2A teams qualified, two handfuls of individuals will head east next weekend.
Tumwater senior Alexandra Broome was the district runner-up in 19:57 and now she’ll aim to nab her first ever state medal in Pasco. It’s Broome’s best finish at districts and she also ran the same time she did as a junior.
Broome will have a teammate alongside her with freshman Juliet Fox qualifying with a 19th place finish.
W.F. West had the most qualifiers amongst the area schools with three, led by Joy Cushman and her seventh place day in 20:59. Her first and only year of high school cross country for the multi-sport star will end in Pasco.
Azami Eckerson will be back at state for the second straight year by placing 11th and Kate Turner made the biggest jump for the Bearcats, going from 50th a year ago to 17th on Thursday and her time was 90 seconds faster.
Black Hills’ Maddie Knight took 10th to return to the state meet and senior Averie Reynolds, who missed out on a state berth by one place last fall, will be next to Knight after a 22nd place afternoon.
Centralia’s duo of Lisel Stout (18th) and Ellie Stout (27th) both qualified for state. And in the 1A race, the lone area qualifier was Rochester’s Mckenzie Blankenship who took 22nd in 23:47. Tenino’s highest runner was Aurora Johnson in 33rd.
