ML King has 3 pretty good male transfers. Only problem is that 1 of them is going to run against girls. This is an absolute travesty to girls sports, which should be protected beyond the limits of any political agenda.
If the other two ML King transfers are good enough to score for the boys team, that will make them at least 7-deep and possibly the favorite in CA. They have a very good #1 runner in Zavaleta (arguably the best incoming junior in CA)
If the other two ML King transfers are good enough to score for the boys team, that will make them at least 7-deep and possibly the favorite in CA. They have a very good #1 runner in Zavaleta (arguably the best incoming junior in CA)
Neither will be scorers on that team, but they do give them depth They’re 16:30 guys.
Maximo is the best incoming Junior in California and the 8th best returner overall. Great talent and a great kid.
If the other two ML King transfers are good enough to score for the boys team, that will make them at least 7-deep and possibly the favorite in CA. They have a very good #1 runner in Zavaleta (arguably the best incoming junior in CA)
Neither will be scorers on that team, but they do give them depth They’re 16:30 guys.
Maximo is the best incoming Junior in California and the 8th best returner overall. Great talent and a great kid.
8th best returner? How do you roughly rank the top CA returners going to HS cross country next year?
I assume Evan Noonan… Stefanopoulos?… &… Broen Holman??? Who else?
If the other two ML King transfers are good enough to score for the boys team, that will make them at least 7-deep and possibly the favorite in CA. They have a very good #1 runner in Zavaleta (arguably the best incoming junior in CA)
Neither will be scorers on that team, but they do give them depth They’re 16:30 guys.
Maximo is the best incoming Junior in California and the 8th best returner overall. Great talent and a great kid.
16:30 in 3-mile or 5k? Kind of a big difference here
Snubbing St. Francis (MV) girls from your Top 7 team list is wild given the fact they have finished #4-#9 at Clovis/State Merge in the last 2 years and again, return all of their scorers from last year. Most of the schools on your list lose some of their scorers and some aren’t even 5-runners deep!
St. Francis runners don't even talk to each other on long runs. 6th-10th place at the state meet is as far as they will go.
Agreed because of the injuries unfortunately :(. They have the talent to do very well but almost always have a couple of top runners injured (except 2019 when they were 2nd at state with no seniors)
The teams are so close I wouldn't even try to rank them sequentially, as I just think about them in tiers. Right I see the top tier of NXN candidates as just 3 teams, Great Oak, ML King and Jesuit. Every other team listed, plus a few more, are in the next tier. Based on the strength of other regions returning teams, I don't see California getting an at-large at this moment in time, so I am looking for the 2 NXN teams to come from the top 3. Of course, last year at this time in my rankings, the clear #1 was Ventura. And Dana Hills was #8 with seemingly no hope for NXN because they were 4 deep. Then Dana Hills got a game changing transfer and Ventura got injuries. This leads me to not spend too much time on trying to rank them in such detail yet.
Great Oak has the best returning group based on the XC season (if you include Westin Brown), but Jesuit and ML King has better returning track times
Waiting for confirmation but JSerra is said to have 4:20 1600 transfer enrolled to add to their bag. Would make 4 runners under 4:20.
How would a team that could run 14:40, 15:20, 15:30, 15:45, 15:50 do at Woodward Park at the state championship?
Depends on division but I would assume at least top 3.
A California boys team needed to average better than 15:31 to make it to NXN last year, the fastest yet. If a team runs/ran faster than that (which it does in your scenario: 15:25) then it will most likely go to NXN at least through at-large selection.
Also, that first guy would definitely go as an individual and maybe win NXN lol. Sahlman did with that time.
Very nice analysis, Rea Sea. I believe you're using finishing order from last year's state meet. I believe the girls on at least one of those teams made a huge leap during track season, however. How would the top 5 teams stack up based on 3200m times?
Very nice analysis, Rea Sea. I believe you're using finishing order from last year's state meet. I believe the girls on at least one of those teams made a huge leap during track season, however. How would the top 5 teams stack up based on 3200m times?
Phasor, I used all 5k PR's. Not just State meets. Of course all of the courses are different, and anyone could find a million contingencies, but it's still fun to compare.
As for 3200 times, per your request, I ran the numbers below, creating a hypothectical Cross Country meet based on the top 30 teams in the country, but I'm not sure it can be relied on because people like Sadie Engelhart didn't even run the 3200 in track. I added her to Ventura's roster, but don't have time to add all the other transfers, or look for other XC girls who didn't run the 3200. I also added a transfer to Trabuco's lineup, and it pushed them way up. I didn't add all the other transfers we talked about earlier in this thread.
1-Mountain Vista High School (CO) Total-112 2-Trabuco Hills (CA) Total-125 3-Romeo (MI) Total-159 4-Ventura (CA) Total-197 5-James W. Robinson (VA) Total-234 6-Santiago Corona (CA) Total-235 7-Wayzata High School (MN) Total-254 8-Buchanan (CA) Total-303 9-Brentwood High School (TN) Total-316 10-Barrington (IL) Total-327 11-Holland West Ottawa (MI) Total-347 12-Carmel High School (IN) Total-364 13-JSerra Catholic (CA) Total-377 14-Flower Mound (TX) Total-378 15-Carroll High School (TX) Total-382 16-Bolles HS (FL) Total-389 17-Fort Wayne Concordia Lutheran High School (IN) Total-394 18-Niwot High School (CO) Total-405 19-Del Norte (CA) Total-417 20-Oyster River High School (NH) Total-417
Very nice analysis, Rea Sea. I believe you're using finishing order from last year's state meet. I believe the girls on at least one of those teams made a huge leap during track season, however. How would the top 5 teams stack up based on 3200m times?
Phasor, I used all 5k PR's. Not just State meets. Of course all of the courses are different, and anyone could find a million contingencies, but it's still fun to compare.
As for 3200 times, per your request, I ran the numbers below, creating a hypothectical Cross Country meet based on the top 30 teams in the country, but I'm not sure it can be relied on because people like Sadie Engelhart didn't even run the 3200 in track. I added her to Ventura's roster, but don't have time to add all the other transfers, or look for other XC girls who didn't run the 3200. I also added a transfer to Trabuco's lineup, and it pushed them way up. I didn't add all the other transfers we talked about earlier in this thread.
1-Mountain Vista High School (CO) Total-112 2-Trabuco Hills (CA) Total-125 3-Romeo (MI) Total-159 4-Ventura (CA) Total-197 5-James W. Robinson (VA) Total-234 6-Santiago Corona (CA) Total-235 7-Wayzata High School (MN) Total-254 8-Buchanan (CA) Total-303 9-Brentwood High School (TN) Total-316 10-Barrington (IL) Total-327 11-Holland West Ottawa (MI) Total-347 12-Carmel High School (IN) Total-364 13-JSerra Catholic (CA) Total-377 14-Flower Mound (TX) Total-378 15-Carroll High School (TX) Total-382 16-Bolles HS (FL) Total-389 17-Fort Wayne Concordia Lutheran High School (IN) Total-394 18-Niwot High School (CO) Total-405 19-Del Norte (CA) Total-417 20-Oyster River High School (NH) Total-417
Thanks for this, Rea Sea. I'm amazed at how you're able to do this type of analysis.
It's very interesting to see the leap by Trabuco Hills. They had several girls make big progress in the 3200 during track season, so I had a hunch they would do well when looking at 3200 times. And of course it seems like 3200 times would have good predictive power for the following XC season. They will have 5 girls who go sub-11 in the 3200. I doubt there is another school in CA who can say the same, other than perhaps Santiago? Then you have Ventura who has 4-5 sub-5 milers. J Serra has a whole stable of fast runners, but several of them do very well in middle distances but struggle a little (relatively) with XC distances. Finally, there's Buchanan who did incredibly well last year with a young group. It will be very interesting to see how those 5 teams shake out at state and which of them make it to NXN.
Thanks for this, Rea Sea. I'm amazed at how you're able to do this type of analysis.
It's very interesting to see the leap by Trabuco Hills. They had several girls make big progress in the 3200 during track season, so I had a hunch they would do well when looking at 3200 times. And of course it seems like 3200 times would have good predictive power for the following XC season. They will have 5 girls who go sub-11 in the 3200. I doubt there is another school in CA who can say the same, other than perhaps Santiago? Then you have Ventura who has 4-5 sub-5 milers. J Serra has a whole stable of fast runners, but several of them do very well in middle distances but struggle a little (relatively) with XC distances. Finally, there's Buchanan who did incredibly well last year with a young group. It will be very interesting to see how those 5 teams shake out at state and which of them make it to NXN.
You would think 3200 times would be the best predictive tool, but when you think about some of the top runners who rarely ran the 3200 at all are often some of the best in XC. It might not translate.
Trabuco is very good and very young with 4 rising juniors, just like Santiago. Ventura, Buchanan, Santiago and J Serra have more runners with more foot speed and enough depth to rest their A team at CIF prelims, but Trabuco doesn't have that luxury. They'll have to run their top 5, 3 weeks in a row.
Also, I wouldn't say Buchanan did "incredibly well", as their state XC title streak ended, and their top runners didn't improve much. Still, they have soooo many options. Even if some top runners fall off, their younger, hungrier runners will fill any voids.
It's all so interesting, though. I hope to see a lot of media coverage of these teams at Woodbridge, and especially at Clovis, when the transfers run for their teams for the first time (after their sit out period expires).
Cool thing is how competitive all these girls are, yet they all appear to truly like and respect their opponents. I expect a little more tension this year, just because it's such a tight race. It will bring out the best in all of them.