PEA RIDGE — John King’s running Blackhawks take to the field Saturday to compete in the Class AAAA State High School Cross Country Championships that will be held on the campus of Rogers High School.
Local fans ought to get on over to Rogers by 11 a.m. to support their team in what will be the closest in proximity that state competition in any sport will perhaps ever have.
The ’Hawk boys have consistently been ranked in state’s top five this year and could have a shot at a top three finish.
For those unfamiliar with the sport of cross country, the scoring goes kind of like golf in that the lowest score wins. The first runner in for the team competition gets scored with one point, with the second runner getting two, third getting three, and so on. The top five runners for each team count for a score.
Each team can put nine runners into the race with the teams’ sixth, seventh, eighth and ninth best runners also having the ability to affect the scoring. If one team’s sixth runner can beat another team’s fifth runner, then the other team’s score gets worsened by a point. For example, if team A’s first four runners in beats team B’s first four runners in, but team B’s fifth through ninth runners come in ahead of team A’s fifth runner, team B would most likely win.
When I was coaching cross country back in the 1980s, I took a team to theAAU nationals in California. Usually a team has to have at least a couple of All-Americans (top 25) to have a chance of winning a national title.
In this particular year, a southern California team placed three individuals among the top 10 runners, so everybody thought they probably had a lock on the title. My top girl came in 26th with the other six placing fairly close behind with my seventh place runner coming in 65th out of the more than 200 runners competing.
We were all a bit surprised that our team actually ended up winning nationals by a single point as southern California’s fifth runner finished far back in the pack. When everything was all sorted out, we also discovered that our fifth girl passed their fourth girl in the final 100 meters to turn a 1 point loss into a 1 point win.
In cross country, every single runner is important Many meets are won and lost on the results of a team’s fifth best runner.
There is probably no other sport where a team effort is more essential than in cross country.
This past local season on the junior high level, the Lady Blackhawk girls had by far the best trio of lead runners of any 4A or smaller school in this partof the state. As it is only the second season to have the sport here in junior high, depth and experience will only get better.
With all three of the runners only eighth graders, add a little more depth and talent and the girls will be a legitimate contender for a state championship in the not too distant future.
Gridiron ’Hawks on the road for season finale
The trek to Berryville will mark the ’Hawks’ last game of the 2010 season.
For the first time all season, Pea Ridge goes in as the favorite, albeit by a small margin (3 points).
Both teams are 1-8 on the season, 0-6 in the conference. Both teams are vastly better than they were a year ago, and both teams are looking for better things in the future.
While Pea Ridge has the same record at this point of the season a year ago, the ’Hawks are a much sounder team. There were several games a year ago that that were not really competitive while this year, only Shiloh reallyhad their way with the locals.
Of the eight losses this season, five could have conceivably been victories absent the ’Hawks seeming penchant for penalties, injuries, turnovers and just plain bad luck.
A year ago, Berryville was getting routinely crushed on a regular basis, but while they have not won more, they have definitely been more competitive. You can bet that they have circled this game on the calendar. For a losing team to have a victory to go into the off season with is of incalculable importance.
District has three in state’s top 20
Three of our conference teams reside among the top 20 teams in the state according to the latest Hooten’s high school football poll.
As expected for the past few weeks, Shiloh, Gravette, Ozark and Gravette will finish as the league’s playoff teams, although not necessarily in that order. Ozark travels to Gentry this Friday in a game that will determine who will earn the No. 3 seed with the loser to settle for No. 4.
The loser will take the No. 4 seed and will have to take on one of the top three teams in the super tough 4A-7 District with all three teams ranked in the state’s top six. The three teams are Pulaski Academy (8-1), Pulaski Robinson (7-2) and Nashville (7-2). The league’s fourth best team is Malvern who is ranked ninth in the state. The Ozark/ Gentry winner takes on the fourth place winner in the 4A-2 district.
District State rankings 1st 1st Shiloh 2nd 14th Gravette 3rd 20th Ozark 4th 23rd Gentry 5th 34th Farmington 6th 35th Prairie Grove 7th 39th Pea Ridge 8th 42nd Berryville
Shiloh will most likely play Hamburg in the first round with Gravette taking on the 3rd place finisher from the 4A-3, northeast Arkansas area.
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Editor’s note: John McGee is the art teacher at Pea Ridge elementary schools, coaches elementary track and writes a regular sports column for The TIMES. He can be contacted through The Times at prtnews@ nwaonline.com.
Sports, Pages 8 on 11/03/2010