By David Paulsen
SPORTS CORRESPONDENT
A fifth-place finish by the Union Grove High School boys cross country team had head coach Kyle Patoka smiling at the Southern Lakes Conference meet held Saturday at UW-Parkside.
“(We were) six points behind Burlington so we’ve made a lot of progress this season,” Patoka exclaimed. “Our sights have been on beating them. That would put us in the top half of the conference.”
Junior Bailey Davis led the Bronco boys with a 12th-place finish, which earned him second-team all-conference honors. Davis was clocked in 17 minutes 36.7 seconds over the 5,000-meter boys course.
Senior Logan Kohlhagen was 19th with a time of 17:52.0, followed by junior Luke Johnson in 30th (18:19.7).
Just eight seconds behind Johnson in 18:27.7 was junior Sam Schaefer (32nd).
Senior Tommy Ruge was another 30 seconds back in 18:57.0 (36th position). Ruge 36th-place finish completed the team scoring.
Sophomore Bret Wolter another minute back in 19:58.6 (41st), junior Kyle Martinez was right behind Wolter in 19:59.5 (42nd).
As a team, Union Grove tallied 129 points. The Westosha Central boys dominated the meet totaling a mere 23 points. Their top five runners all finished in the top eight positions.
With the team losing only two seniors, Patoka said he is excited about continuing to build the team next year.
The highlight for the Bronco girls was the performance of junior Madelyn Schwartz. Schwartz made first-team all-conference with a third-place finish. She was clocked in 15:40.0 over the 4,000-meter girls course.
Schwartz was inched out at the finish by Westosha’s Maria Sabourin, but the 15:40 time was a personal record.
“This is her second year in a row with all-conference (first-team) honors,” Patoka noted.
Last year, Schwartz also finished third in the SLC meet.
No other Bronco girl was close to Schwartz, with sophomore Anna Peterson the second fastest Bronco in 17:29.6. That was good enough for 34th place overall.
The next four Bronco runners ran as a pack, and finished 40th, 41st, 42nd and 43rd.
Junior Brianna DeBrabander was 40th in 17:58.2, sophomore Lexi Marsh 41st in 17:59.6, junior Ashley Paulick 42nd in 18:02.2, and senior McKenna Chriske 43rd in 18:08.6.
Freshman Whitney Vieau finished off the varsity runners with a 48th-place finish in 19:15.7.
As a team, the Bronco girls were sixth overall with 160 points. Westosha Central also dominated the girls event, tallying just 20 points. Westosha’s top five girls finished in the top seven places.
Only Union Grove’s Schwartz and Burlington’s Kit Kocha (fifth) ran with the Westosha top five.
Patoka noted that the varsity and junior varsity races were combined at this meet in order to get them completed before rain came.
Next up for both squads is the WIAA Division 1 sectional at Grant Park in South Milwaukee on Saturday.The boys race is at 10:45 a.m. and the girls race at 11:30 a.m.
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