The course at Liberty Trails in Big Lake was the site for the  2021 Mississippi 8 Conference Cross-Country Championships Tuesday afternoon.  

The weather was near ideal as the teams from Becker, Big Lake, Cambridge-Isanti, Chisago Lakes, Monticello, North Branch, Princeton, and St. Francis competed for team championships and all-conference honors.  

This meet also marked the last meet for Big Lake’s middle school and junior varsity teams.  

“It has been an absolutely fabulous season thus far, our team has grown and improved throughout this season,” said Head Coach Todd Trutna. “I want to thank all those runners that finished their season today.  The coaches are so proud of all of you and thank you for your hard work and dedication.”

The boys’ varsity continued their battle with their rivals from across the river.  Both teams are ranked highly in state Class AA with Big Lake second and Monticello third. After running against each other five times this season, the schools are very familiar with each other.  

Big Lake came out on top by three points to win the team conference title.  Big Lake repeated as conference champs as they also won the championship last year over Monticello by one point.    

“Given the size of the meet, we knew this would be a tough test for the boys,” said Trutna.  “We didn’t run our best race, but we did the little things to get the victory.”  

Individually, Owen Layton finished second, Chirstian Noble third, Kade Layton fifth, and Jack Leuer was sixth.  All five garnered Mississippi 8 All-Conference Honors.  

“It’s pretty amazing to place four runners in the top six in a conference of this quality,” said Big Lake’s coach.  “It is a testament to how hard these guys run during track and the summer.”  

David Guyse and Tannon Jacobson earned Honorable Mention All-Conference honors with their 17th and 23rd place finishes.  

“It was a very tight race at the end and David made a surge and picked up a couple points right at the finish,” Trutna said.  

Luke Hugo and Carter Erickson rounded out the varsity squad with 29th and 38th place finishes.

The ever improving girls’ varsity showed tremendous improvement from their race on this same course from earlier in the year.  

“It took a few meets for us to get our legs back under us this season,” said Trutna of the girls team.  “Once they got back into ‘race’ mode, our times started to improve.”  

Trutna said this year was a bit of a transition for these girls as they lost five members off of the team’s section team from last year.  

“Several of the younger runners have stepped up to fill that void,” he said.  “This team will continue to become more competitive over the next couple seasons.”  

Emille Doperalski was the lead Hornet in 27th place, improving by 1:15 from the start of the year.  Erin Kjellberg and Cambell Slattery were next across the line, both improving by over five minutes from the same course at the start of the year.  Grace Heider and Jax Ages were the final two scorers for Big Lake.  Samantha Burton, Rylie Ostrom, and Olivia Potter  also improved by several minutes as well.  

“It is so great to see the growth and improvement over the season,” Trutna said.

Leading the JV squad was senior Matthew Denzen.  His 15th place finish helped pace the Hornets to a third place team finish.  Most of the boy’s JV runners averaged a two minute improvement from the start of the season.  Gavin Vold, Adiel Cisneros, Jonah Overby, and Oliver Aronson rounded out the scorers.  

The girls’ JV team also finished third.   They were led by Jadyn Rust, Georgia Morris, Nicole Rempel, and Sophia Tienter.  All placed in the top 30.

The middle school boys and girls had solid races to end their season. Brynn Scheer and Paiton Ganley were the top MS girl finishers.  Alton Ahamed and Gavin Flavin went 4-5 in the boys’ race and helped the Hornets to a third place team finish.  Trent Erickson ran a solid race to place inside the top 20 as well.  

“Several of these eighth grade boys will be pushing to earn a varsity spot next year,” Trutna said. “It will be exciting to see everyone’s growth over the next few seasons.” 

Up Next 

The Hornet varsity teams head to Becker Thurs., Oct. 28 for the Section 5AA Championship.