On Wednesday, Sept. 20, the cross-country team won the All-City Championship for the first time ever. After 13 years of losing to Highland, East, and West (all 5A schools), the combined scores of the Judge girls’ and boys’ teams were enough to beat Highland by a narrow one-point victory.
Cross country is scored by giving a point value to the placement of a runner. The first-place finisher’s team is given one point, the second-place finisher two points, and so on. Only the first five finishers from a team are scored and the lowest score wins.
The meet was so close if any other runner passed a Judge runner on either the boys or girls team, Highland would have won. The coaching staff knew they had a chance to win but “needed to have some special races to happen,” assistant coach Mr. Ring said. Unfortunately, early in the race one of the varsity girls fell down and was out of the race. The coaches communicated that to the other girls who had to step up and make back some of the points.
Heading into the boy’s race, Highland was winning by nine points. Despite two of the starting runners coming off injuries, breakout performances by freshman Talen Eischad and sophomore Eli Johnson were enough to beat Highland by ten points, giving the win to Judge.
“It was a great way to kick off the cross country postseason,” Ring said. “It is a defining moment in the two teams coming and bonding together to accomplish some very special things.”
