Let's talk Ohio HS XC

This is an interesting exchange from last year, in light of what happened on Saturday.

Can Hil. Davidson boys team qualify for the state meet next year?

Sure. Davidson could.

Going into the 2024 season, will Orange, Coffman, and Scioto be the top teams throughout the season? And then who?

Coffman is ranked 11th for the central region on milesplit for returners next year. So no. We will see a flip from the usual top teams, as Davidson, Coffman, and Lancaster are all outside the top 11 for the central region. Orange, Liberty, and Scioto should take over, with Jerome and West. north. Thomas has a chance to because I think their MS won states.

I've been thinking about the Central Ohio class of '18 vs class of '24 debate and laid out below what I believe to be the best representation of the battle:
'18: Kreft, Scrape, Jha, Bons, Payne
'24: Gableman, Ricchiuti, Smith (replace with Day if you believe he shouldn't count due to his DNF tendencies), McMahon, Rudraraju

I've got it scored as:
1. Kreft ('18)
2. Gableman ('24)
3. Scrape ('18)
4. Ricchiuti ('24)
5. Jha ('18)
6. Bons ('18)
7. Smith ('24)
8. McMahon ('24)
9. Payne ('18)
10. Rudraraju ('24)

This gives a final score of 24 ('18) to 31 ('24). A 7-point margin is wider than I had anticipated, so I'd love to get everyone's thoughts over it. Am I underrating the class of '24? Or is '18 truly a step above?

Coffman is graduating most of their varsity. So is Lancaster

We said the same thing last year, and yet they both reloaded and made the state meet. Don’t count em out

Hard to say for sure which class was better since it’s XC and times can be unpredictable, but what I will say is that I’m skeptical of Krefts time. 14:29 mid season while he didn’t break 15 at any other meet? I remember people talking about that when it happened how ridiculous that time was. Seems weird to me, I would probably give the edge to Gabelman. However it’s still xc and many of these guys could probably take the win against 1 another on any given day. Team wise it would also be very close, probably only a few points difference

Marlington was able to 3-peat

The “woe is me” attitude you display for paying attention to a team all season and then getting upset that they didn’t do well is pathetic. You didn’t put in any of the work that those kids did, nor did you invest the time that the coaches did but you’re acting like they owed it to you to do well just because you checked results..

Also, I would be interested to know if you ever qualified for states or even contributed on varsity when you ran in HS. Tough to hold people to a standard that you likely never achieved yourself.

Besides Gabelman, I still think they underperformed and it was other people who pointed out they have a history of sliding late season. But if they're happy with their results at states, then that's all that matters.

Off and on, I've been skeptical of that time since Kreft put it up. It was at the 2017 XC season MMOC meet. That year the meet was at Darby instead of Bradley because of construction at Bradley. The MMOC was previously held at Darby in the early 2000s through to 2010. There was also the Darby Dash that was held there back around the same time. Lately the course has been used as a district site.

If the course is the same now as when Kreft ran his time, then it is probably legitimate. IIRC, the weather conditions on the day of the meet were nearly ideal. Horter was also pushing Kreft and came in at 14:36. Behind Horter was Lucas Bons in 15:13 and at that time Bons was one of the top XC and miler guys in Ohio. Just this past year at Bradley Gableman won his district putting up a 14:55 to Day's 15:05 and at districts last year, Ackley ran 15:04 to beat McMahon by a minute.

The course is flat and fast, the conditions were ideal, Kreft had someone pushing him, and if it is the same course as is currently being run for the district meets, there shouldn't be a reason to doubt it. Also, Kreft was and is one hell of a runner. If he ran at a D1 school at that time I believe that he would have been pushed more and put up faster times overall. Since time really doesn't matter in XC, he did what he needed to do to win based on his competition.

On the 2018 class as a whole, it was ridiculously talented in all of Ohio and the entire country. So many of the guys from that class have had a big impact at the collegiate level.

Lancaster lost 4 of their top 5 from last year, and they went from winning the Pickerington region to barely qualifying for the state meet.

Coffman lost their top 2 but they actually returned everyone else on their varsity. So it’s not surprising that they are great again.

Lancaster still qualified for the state meet. Many programs that lost that many wouldn't have even made it out of their district meet. That points to good coaching.

Some programs always seem to "reload." Lancaster has had tradition and good coaching for years. Mason always reloads as well and has excellent coaching but part of their ability to reload has to do with the sheer size of the school and the numbers of athletes. That is not to take away from Mason's coaching. It's just a fact. Not all schools have the luxury of having that many athletes.

I’m not sure that you really acknowledged any of my points

They did underperform. huge. As you pointed out. Aside from Ben, their guys ran a good 30-40 seconds slower than they've been running all year. It's easy to see. I don't know what that other guy expects you to apologize for calling it like it is. They were ranked 2nd at one point - they week after their 2-5 guys were all rolling in at Tiffin around 16:10-15 - and then ended up 18th at state with those same guys struggling to get under 17:00.

Some teams run well (Jackson, Medina, Orange) and some teams don't (North, Lancaster). I don't think it's some crime to express disappointment or state facts.

Probably because your points were dumb. No one's personal PR has any relevance. Some of the most insightful people on here are the slowest. And often times the fastest runners are the most delusional, failing to see anything other than their own perspective from the front of the pack.

Thank you. I didn’t think I was way off base.

For the other questions to me. No, I was not the most talented runner on the team. However, I don’t see that my personal abilities are relevant to the results of this state meet. I am now only a spectator of the sport and I admit that.

I do not mean to attack or criticize. If anything I feel sympathy for them for not going out on a high note like I’m sure they wanted to.

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Meet results and team scores.

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