EV Girls Grab Title In Repeat

All year Nick Lazanis worried about the expectations placed on his East Valley girls cross country team.

Not to worry. With District 7-AA champion Angie Simmers finishing sixth for the second consecutive year and sophomore Cara Smith overcoming a weeklong sickness to place 15th, the Knights repeated as State AA champions on Saturday.

“Sometimes it’s a lot easier to be pursuing than to be pursued,” Lazanis said after top-ranked EV edged South Whidbey during the WIAA/ U.S. Bank state meet at chilled Sun Willows Golf Course.

EV, with 92 points, scored four less than South Whidbey in a repeat of last year’s 1-2 team finish.

“I honestly thought (South Whidbey) would be down a little bit,” Lazanis said. “I was looking at Ephrata (which finished fourth).”

Smith hadn’t run this week because of flu-like symptoms. She shook off the setback to beat EV’s typical No. 2 runner, Ann Marie Adams, by three places.

“This field is really strong,” Simmers said after completing the 3 miles in 18 minutes, 7 seconds - 17 seconds swifter than last year. “It sucks that West Valley isn’t running here, too.”

Not as a team, perhaps, because the Frontier League receives just one berth to state. Yet Heather Harmon (18:09) of the Eagles took eighth while teammate Jessica Riehle (18:16) settled for 10th. ‘Settled’ because Riehle won here as a freshman in 1993 and finished third last year.

Junior Ann Ramsey of Lakeside, last year’s 10th-place finisher, won in 17:45, 13 seconds up on the field.

The top-ranked Gig Harbor Tides and individual boys champion Geoff Perry also won with relative ease. Perry’s 14:54 was 9 seconds better than Nathan Hale’s Cary Stidham. The Tides scored 76 to cruise by runner-up WV (114).

“We’ve been ranked second all year and I really thought that we were the second-best team,” said WV coach Jim McLachlan. “I don’t know if we could have run much better than we did.”

WV’s Clayton Holmes, the district runner-up, led area runners with a 15:25 effort, good for 10th. District champ Chris Henderson of East Valley was 2 seconds slower and three places further back.

Levi Lounder of WV, who struggled at district, fought back for 25th - the Eagles’ second-best showing.

Jon Ashcraft from Riverside, third at district, was not listed in state results. The reason was unclear.

, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: Color photo