Los Alamos: New Mexico's green wall of girls. Photo by Blake Wood.
The UHSAA season is now in the books, and we'll start this regional review with a fairly detailed look at the Utah state cross country meet.
To nobody's surprise, American Fork was completely dominant. Austin West was back in uniform for the Cavemen, but a little out of top form. West finished sixth overall and fourth on the American Fork team at 15:47 for the three-mile course. Clayton Young won individual honors at 15:23. AF's 21 team points easily outdistanced second-place Davis's 75 points. In merged scoring from all classifications, though, Davis still edged out Pine View (4A) for second. Pine View topped Mountain View for the 4A team title.
In terms of merged results, American Fork, Davis, Pine View, and Mountain View stand clearly ahead of the rest of the Utah boys' teams. While I do not make the NXN-SW championship race selections, these four teams are clearly worthy of entries. Beyond that point, the Utah teams that get in should depend a great deal on how many teams register for the championship race and which teams register for the championship race.
I don't even care to speculate about individual entries (boys or girls) in the championship race at this point.
For the girls, Davis produced a definitive victory in 5A. Skyline was alone in second, and then American Fork and Alta in a near dead heat in third. 4A saw Ogden at the front of the class with Mountain Crest and Mountain View as the only other teams within shouting distance. In 3A, Park City narrowly defeated Cedar. In combined scoring, Ogden extends the season-long pattern in taking the title from Davis. The two 3A programs, Cedar and Park City, displace all other larger school programs except Mountain View from the top five. Mountain Crest gets sixth, and then there's a sizeable gap to Skyline in seventh.
It may take a smarter guy than me to determine who gets championship race bids if they all register, but given recent performances by Utah teams at NXN-SW, any of the top six should be in a relatively strong position.
In terms of history on the state course (and for the information that follows I am indebted to Timo Mostert), American Fork posted the fastest-ever team time for the Utah state meet. They beat their record time from last year by over 90 seconds! Davis's team time ranks 7th on the all-time list and Pine View's time ranks 10th. The girls did not fare as well. Ogden's team time ranks 11th on the all-time list. By way of comparison, the Mountain View and American Fork team times from last year both rank ahead of Ogden's mark this year.
Course conditions vary from year to year, and it was considerably warmer for this year's Utah state meet than last year's. That should add a little credence to American Fork's team course record.
In Colorado, it was regional qualifying weekend. Regionals thin the field a little more in Colorado than they do in other SW region states (though that may not include Arizona this year under the realignment of classifications). That said, none of the top contenders among Colorado teams experienced any difficulty in advancing to state. Among the boys, Heritage, Fort Collins, and Monarch easily advanced. The biggest event of note was probably the fact that Fairview pulled to within four points of Monarch in 5A Region 3. If Fairview can validate that result at this week's state meet, that is a huge statement.
Several other Colorado boys teams kept regional championship hopes alive with their performances this week--including Smoky Hill, Cherry Creek, Dakota Ridge, Cheyenne Mountain, Arapahoe, and probably a handful more. A few, like Palmer and Thompson Valley, may have breathed some new life into championship race hopes, but Saturday will tell us a great deal more.
As was with the case with the boys, all girls' teams in position to challenge for a championship race bid advanced to state easily. Monarch nipped Boulder in 5A Region 3, but neither team needs much in the way of additional credibility. Look for a showdown of epic proportions at the 5A girls state race on Saturday. Fort Collins, Arapahoe, Cherry Creek, Highlands Ranch, Liberty, Pine Creek, Evergreen (4A), and The Classical Academy (3A) each advanced with ease.
Cheyenne Mountain and Greeley Central were both victims of 4A regional upsets, but it's hard to say what those upsets mean when winning your regional isn't a requirement to advance. Niwot may have pumped the bellows on the flame of their hopes with a sterling regional performance.
It's a given that not all of the highly-ranked girls teams from Colorado will be headed down to Phoenix, but those that do should be more than able to hold their own.
Colorado Front Page (links to all regional results)
Los Alamos (remember them?) hosted the big event of the weekend in New Mexico. Still, it was a quiet weekend in the Land of Enchantment between the Rio Rancho Jamboree and the regional meets on tap for next weekend.
Albuquerque Academy continued a season of domination over the NM boys teams at Los Alamos. Los Alamos, however, had a very nice run of places four through nine to dominate the girls' team scoring. Julia Foster was back from recruiting visits and in top form to win the individual title.
Although the 3-mile times from Los Alamos don't look all that impressive consider that it's not an easy course and it's at 7200 feet elevation. Rolling terrain at 7000 feet is a new experience in screaming lung tissue.
While we're on the topic of New Mexico high school cross country, a local coach by the name of Jimmy Butler produces a set of computer rankings on NM teams and individuals. You can't find these rankings just anywhere, but I feel curiously validated by the fact that his rankings match my estimations of the quality of New Mexico teams very nicely. He ranks the boys teams as: Albuquerque Academy, La Cueva, Los Alamos, Shiprock, and Rio Rancho. Shiprock hadn't yet arrived on my radar screen, but I will watch them more closely now, especially with regionals and state directly ahead. Butler ranks the top five girls teams as: Los Alamos, Eldorado, Hobbs, La Cueva, and Cleveland. Hobbs has been on the fringes of my personal radar screen to this point, but it will be interesting to follow them as state approaches.
AA and La Cueva seem like next-thing-to-sure-things for boys' team entries into the regional championship race. Ditto for the Los Alamos (especially after this weekend) and Eldorado girls. There's plenty of time and opportunity for other teams to state their cases. These four teams, however, have been reasonably dominant in New Mexico to this point in the season.
Things were even quieter in Arizona and Nevada than they were in New Mexico. Teams that wanted some cross country action mostly headed over into sunny California to find it.
The Xavier College Prep girls finished sixth overall in the team sweepstakes at Mt. SAC. If memory serves me correctly, that's an improvement of two places over last year in a very competitive field. Sarah Fakler ran 17:20 on the 2.92 mile course for sixth among the team sweeps individuals. Kylee Kieser (Marcos De Niza, AZ) finished 10th in the individual sweepstakes.
I'm told there were some additional Arizona and Nevada entries at Mt. SAC, but I've gone cross-eyed and I've about worn out my mouse clicking on the haystack of race results from Mt. SAC without finding those teams or individuals. If you're an Arizona or Nevada team or individual in search of a second or two of notoriety, please send another hint my way 
.
Mt. SAC results (as they go up)
Official Meet Site (results included, but the results are not searchable)
As with New Mexico, Arizona and Nevada go the regional qualifying races in the week ahead. That would help to explain why so many teams are laying low at this point.
Nevada's regional qualifying will take place on Thursday and Friday. Arizona's regional qualifying races will take place on Saturday.
Los Alamos: New Mexico's green wall of girls. Photo by Blake Wood.