WEST MILTON — The West Liberty-Salem girls cross country team had a solid season opener, placing 3rd out of 20 teams in the DII/III race at the Bob Schul Invitational in West Milton on Saturday.
Minster won the race with 27 points and Russia was second with 75.
Junior Reghan Bieleski led the Tigers with a 3rd place finish (20:26.2) in the field of 217 runners, and freshman Grace Adams cracked the top 25, placing 21st (21:51.4). Also placing for WL-S were Kiana Reames in 38th (23:07), Payton Umphries in 43rd (23:26.5), Lydia Moell in 56th (24:02.1), Lauren Fowler in 70th (24:27), Sarah Painter in 96th (25:03.7), Anna Louden in 116th (26:41), Savannah Weaver in 130th (27:10.1) and Tory Pawelko in 144th (28:01).
“Placing third and beating two of last year’s D-III state qualifying teams is a good way to start the season. There’s plenty of room for improvement, however, and we need continue to do the little things that will allow us to be physically and mentally more competitive as the season progresses,” WL-S Coach Ann Vogel said.
The Tiger boys team finished 7th in the same event. Fairfield won the race, followed by Valley View and Brookville.
Michael Conley (11th, 17:32), Nick Williams (12th, 17:32), Noah Smith (18th, 17:41), Charlie Williams (79th, 19:12) and Bryan Woods (106th, 19:53) scored for the Tigers. Isaac Smith (130th), Caleb Siegenthaler (133rd), Matthew Loffing (152nd) and Zavier Esch (207th) also ran.
“I was very pleased with the results of our first meet. We knew going into it we had a lot of very inexperienced guys, so expectations honestly were just getting familiar with the 5K race itself and establishing a starting point to build on going forward. We obviously need to bridge our team’s 3-4 gap and I’m confident with the guys that we have we can make that happen once we’re at full strength,” WL-S Coach Mike Louden said.
WL-S hosts the Logan County Meet on Tuesday starting at 5 p.m. with the middle school boys race, followed by the middle school girls at 5:30, the high school boys at 6 p.m. and the high school girls at 6:30 p.m.
Falcons soar to win
Graham defeated, Piqua 2-1, in boys soccer. Hunter Kauffman scored in the first half, with Brady Oder scoring on an assist from Bryce Anderson for the go-ahead goal in the second half.
Hillclimbers fall
Sidney defeated Urbana, 2-0, in boys soccer. Jalen Hudgens scored twice for the home squad. Tristin Williams made 4 saves for Urbana.
UHS falls to 1-2 on the season.
Tigers trump Vikings
West Liberty-Salem defeated Miami East, 3-0, in non-league girls soccer at Crew Stadium in Columbus on Saturday.
Gabby Hollar scored twice and Taylor Lauck booted home a goal. Hollar, Madison Bender and Ashley Rabenstein each recorded an assist.
Paige Shafer made 3 saves, while Rachel McGill also had a save.
WL-S (2-0) plays at Lehman Catholic on Tuesday.
Urbana girls win
Urbana defeated Mechanicsburg, 4-0, in girls soccer on Saturday.
Tori Jacobs and Skyler Campbell each had 3 shots on goal for the Indians, but were unable to convert. Morgan Hamby recorded 23 saves for the Indians.
M’burg will host Stivers on Tuesday.
Junior high cross country
West Liberty-Salem competed at the Bob Schul Invitational on Saturday, with the girls finishing 4th and the boys finishing 12th.
For the girls, Katelyn Stapleton finished 2nd, Megan Adams was 6th and Madison Bahan was 7th.
For the boys, Dylan Lauck was 28th, Hayden Kennedy was 71st and Isaac Brown was 80th.
