XC Teams compete in state meet

Both the boys and girls teams finished with Top 10 performances at the 2021 GHSA State Cross Country Championship. The 2A classification opened the event Friday followed by the 3A and 4A classifications. The event concluded Saturday with the remaining classes running.
In the boys race, the Yellow Jacket squad was favored to be a top team coming into the race with hopes of the team’s highest finish in program history. However, those hopes came tumbling down less than 200 meters into the race. A Laney High runner was tripped up as the massive pack approached the first turn and went down. The fallen Laney runner caused a massive pileup with approximately 75% of the field being affected. The pileup took down runners from almost every school or caused runners to have to completely stop and re-route around the mass of runners.
The JD squad took a big hit in all the mayhem with the top four JD runners all going down and the remaining JD runners getting held up by the pile. Despite the team taking a hit in the early moments of the race they emerged from the pile and battled back.
Coming out of the pileup the JD team was likely in eighth place and maybe as low as tenth. However, the JD squad never wavered and steadily picked off runners for the remainder of the race. The team ran with heart and closed in on many of the teams that were affected less by the pile up and when the dust settled finished in fourth place and on the podium for the second straight year.
Pace Academy was State Champion, Lovett finished as state runner-up, and Bleckley County finished in third.
In the girls race, the Lady Jackets ran a very impressive race but the deep field pushed the team to a sixth place finish. Region rivals Vidalia avenged their one point loss from the Region 2AA Championship to finish fifth ahead of the Lady Jackets.
While Oglethorpe County ran their best race of the year to jump both Jeff Davis and Vidalia to take the fourth and final podium spot. The other three podium spots finished up as expected and the same as on the boys side as Pace Academy was State Champion, Lovett State Runner-Up, and Bleckley County third.
Boys Results
26. Skyler Cravey, 18:28.75; 29. Levi Manning, 18:32.30; 34. Briley Reyes, 18:36.18; 42. Pierce Parlor, 18:58.42; 45. Kevin Vega, 19:03.91; 76. Josue Avila, 19:54.10; 86. Jovani Barragan, 20:14./66.
Team Scores
1. Pace Academy 28
2. Lovett 76
3. Bleckley 161
4. Jeff Davis 173
5. Banks 181
6. Model 199
7. Oglethorpe 202
8. Fannin 217
9. Bremen 223
10. Vidalia 233
11. Heard 318
12. Lamar 400
13. Riverside 411
14. Union 414
15. Cook 469
16. Dade 484
17. Rabun 488
18. Coosa 506
19. Worth 522
20. Jasper 603
21. East Laurens 609
22. Bacon 624
23. Berrien 657
24. Fitzgerald 667
25. KIPP 667
26. Butler 747
27. Callaway 752
28. Washington County 758
29. Glenn Hills 811
30. Laney 914
Girls Results
17. Zoie Marchant, 21:44.24; 27. Alexandra Uribe, 22:21.64; 54. Lily Relihan, 24:20.49; 55. Flor Rangel, 24:22.32; 67. Joselyn Avila, 24:58.70; 72. Rebecca Lopez, 25:22.46; 98. Ali Lewis, 27:25.62.
Team Scores
1. Pace Academy 27
2. Lovett 61
3. Bleckley 107
4. Oglethorpe 169
5. Vidalia 187
6. Jeff Davis 218
7. Rabun 218
8. Union 219
9. Bremen 247
10. Fannin 289
11. Coosa 296
12. Model 311
13. Jasper 358
14. Worth 363
15. Cook 452
16. Banks 492
17. Fitzgerald 498
18. Elbert 528
19. Gordon Central 570
20. Thomasville 584
21. Putnam 593
22. Toombs 626
23. Washington County 632
24. Heard 687
25. Westside, Augusta 694
26. A.R. Johnson 747
27. Lamar 801
28. Woodville-Tompkins 836
29. Temple 859