SAHS 1st at invite

DECATUR - Only five runners cleared the 22-minute mark Tuesday. Three of them were Starfires.

Hannah Moore, Sawyer Shane and Allison Beitler finished consecutively Tuesday evening to lead the South Adams High School girls cross country team to victory at the Bellmont Invitational.

SAHS finished with 38 points, outdistancing runner-up Leo by 20. Jay County was third with 85 points, three ahead of fourth-place North Side.

The Starfire boys team was third with 87 points behind the host Braves (33) and North Side (40). JCHS does not have enough runners to post a team score.

Moore set the pace for the Starfire girls with her third-place finish in 21 minutes, 39.75 seconds. Sawyer Shane was fourth in 21:41, and Beitler took fifth place in 21:59.

Junior Leah Wellman was the first Jay County runner to cross the finish line as she placed sixth, eight seconds behind Beitler.

Kristen Muselman gave South Adams a third runner in the top 10 as she finished in 22:23 for 10th place. Jenna Smith capped the team score in 16th with a time of 23:19.

Katie Simmons, a sophomore, was the No. 2 runner for the Patriots in 15th place. She had a time of 23:04.

The remaining JCHS scoring runners finished in a pack with Liz Lennartz crossing the line in 24:07 for 21st place. Logan Laux was four seconds behind in 22nd, and Kari Hemmelgarn was four seconds back of Laux in 24th.

Megan Taylor placed 26th in 24:27, and Julie Valentine finished in 27:21 for 44th.

Freshman Evan Liecthy led the South Adams boys at Bellmont with a sixth-place finish in 18:16. Sam Heckard was 10 seconds behind him in seventh place.

Joel Hawbaker finished 19th in 19:28 followed by Andrew Steffen (27th - 19:57) and Daniel Heckard (30th - 20:07).

Dylan Cope had the best time for Jay County in 20:36 for 38th place. Kyle Scott was 64th in 23:08, and Zach Johnson finished 75th in 25:13.[[In-content Ad]]