Girls Steady, Boys Step Up

While the Scottie girls’ cross country team were just as consistently good as they always are on Saturday, in Havre, the boys’ team took a pretty big step forward despite their low team finish in the standings.

The girls took third place with a score of 62 behind a pair of Class A schools, Havre, 36, and Lewistown, 55. They finished in front of Class B Belt-Centerville, Class A Browning and Class B Cut Bank, who all had scores of 100 plus. The boys didn’t place so well with a sixth-place finish in front of only Belt-Centerville. 

However, that was mostly due to their top-two runners, Austin Green and Bridger Sanders, being hampered by physical ailments. Sanders had an abdominal ache that bothered him the entire race and Green suffered a slightly rolled ankle two days before the race. However, those ailments are not expected to slow down Green or Sanders for very long and they’ll get back to being front runners in every race. 

But now, they might have a challenger from within their own team. Junior Matthew Phillips ran his best race of the season, by far, in Havre. He beat his previous season best time, 19 minutes, 8 seconds in Malta, by more than a minute with an outstanding time of 17:57 in Havre. That is an encouraging sign for the Scottie boys if he can keep up that type of pace for the rest of the season.

For the girls, it was business as usual. Josie Braaten, Rachael Zeiger, Amanda Wolff, Emma Fewer and Ellen Walstad finished as the top-five Glasgow runners for the fifth time this season. Braaten also recorded her season-best time with a 19:40 finish.

“[The team] ran well. Overall, it was a good meet,” said Head Coach Rod Karst.

The meet that Karst and the rest of the team has been looking forward to though, is this weekend. They will play host to several teams from across the state for the Scottie Invitational on homecoming weekend. 

“It’s probably the biggest meet on this side of the state,” said Karst. 

Colstrip, St. Labre, Williston, Glendive, Miles City and Sidney are all expected to compete. In addition, Havre and Lewistown may compete if it’s too smokey in Missoula for their scheduled meet. Cut Bank is a possibility as well, according to Karst. 

That’s a ton of talented teams that may run here on Saturday. It could provide a great measuring stick for both Scottie teams, who will be looking to run their best races of the season to date.