St. Cloud scores a perfect 15 to repeat

By Rick Pedone
Sports Editor

It was a perfect day for the St. Cloud Lady Bulldog cross country team, which swept the first six positions and scored the minimum of 15 points while defending its Orange Belt Conference Cross Country championship Wednesday at Poinciana High.

Senior Ashlyn Stadtlander (19:40) successfully defended her individual championship as the Lady Bulldogs won by an overwhelming 75 points over Celebration (90), Harmony (94), Osceola (98), Poinciana (114), Liberty (120) and Gateway (169).

Victory was more dramatic for Liberty’s boys (44), who won their first conference cross country championship over defending champion St. Cloud (49). Runners from the teams fought each other for positions over the last 100 meters of the 5K race. Next came Gateway (85), Harmony (100), Celebration (112) and Osceola (134). Poinciana did not record a team score.

“We lost Robbie (Johnroe to graduation) and these guys don’t have a lot of talent, like Robbie, but they are workers. They just keep grinding away because they want to get better, and you can’t ask for a better situation than that,” Chargers Coach Robert Pauley said.

Celebration senior Quincy O’Connor again led the boys runners, defending his title with a time of 15:57, far ahead of second-place runner Matt Henning (16:49) of Harmony.

“It was definitely a little easier this time,” O’Connor, from New York, said. “Last year, I was still adjusting to things here, but now it’s no problem.”

St. Cloud Coach Kevin Harkema said his team performed to expectations.

“The girls ran awesome,” he said. “To put six at the top, that was amazing. We thought we would have at least five or six on the all-OBC team (top seven runners), but not like this.”

After Stadtlander for St. Cloud came Karissa Solorzano (20:13), Katelyn Stadtlander (20:20), the champion’s sister, Octavia Gonzalez (20:43), Anaya Reid (20:45) and Rebecca Davis (20:47).

Poinciana’s Gabriella Rodriguez (20:51) earned the seventh spot on the all-conference team.

Harmony’s Kylie Koral (21:26), St. Cloud’s Kristin Detroyer (21:37) and Celebration’s Christina Ricci (21:42) rounded out the top 10.

Ashlyn Stadtlander, the News-Gazette runner of the year for 2010, said that both she and the team are prepared for next week’s district meet, and the regional and state meets that follow. St. Cloud competed at the state meet last year.

“I think so. We’re excited, we think we can do real well,” she said. “We worked hard over the summer to get ready, and the (summer) camp in Tennessee helped us get ready. We’re ranked No. 5, and our goal is to be fourth (at the state meet).”

Stadtlander was a little surprised to be so far in front at Wednesday’s race.

“Yeah, I was. I really didn’t expect it,” she said.

Stadtlander said the course, which consisted of three one-mile loops around the back of the Poinciana High campus, isn’t one of her favorites.

“It’s OK. I’ve run it three times now. It’s a little monotonous, but it’s all right,” she said.

After O’ Connor and Henning in the boys race came St. Cloud’s Antonio Montalvo (16:52), Gateway’s Bryan Cudjoe (17:07), St. Cloud’s Matt Cole (17:07) and Liberty’s Rolegio Araiza (17:08) and Javier Artega (17:13), comprising the all-county team.

St. Cloud’s Bailey Morgan (17:14) and Liberty’s Richard Eyiangho (17:19) and Tyler Haase (17:25) rounded out the top 10. Eyituoyo Eyiangho (12th, 17:19) was Liberty’s fifth runner.

Pauley expected a close race with St. Cloud.

“We knew we were going to have to close the gaps on them, and bust them up,” Pauley said. “It worked pretty well. At one mile, we were down by eight points; at two miles, we were down three points, and after about two and a half miles, we were ahead.”

Harkema, who also coaches the boys, wasn’t disappointed with their performance.

“They all ran PRs, so you can’t complain,” Harkema said. “If we had run Friday night (both St. Cloud and Liberty competed at an Orange County meet), we might have won. But, this is Wednesday, not Friday. Congratulations to them, they ran a good race and they deserved it.”

Pauley said running against an established program like St. Cloud’s makes for good competition.

“It helps that you respect the coach, and Coach Harkema has done a great job there for a long time. We respect them, and they respect what we do here. It makes you feel good about the competition, whether you win or lose,” Pauley said.

“I also have to give a lot of credit to my assistant coach, Robert Weilert, because I’ve had to miss some practices and he stepped in and kept everything going. It’s a team effort.”

Osceola (43) beat Celebration (53) for the JV girls championship. They are the only teams that had scores. St. Cloud’s Taylor Swanson (22:01) was the winner.

Liberty (15) dominated the boys JV run over Gateway (45) and Osceola (90). Liberty’s Josh Ortiz (18:55) won.

Harmony will host the 3A-5 district meet Nov. 5 at 9 a.m., where St. Cloud, Celebration and Osceola will compete with several Orange, Seminole and Lake County teams.

“We should do alright,” Harkema said. “The girls are fine, and the guys, after the first month and a half where we had some injuries, have actually come along faster than I thought they would.”

Celebration’s O’Connor will be one of the favorites to win the boys district championship and to advance to regional and state meets for the second straight year.

“My goal is to get to as close to 15 minutes as I can,” he said. “I just want to stay in the mix.”

Storm Coach Bart Roberts said O’Connor will be competing against many of the best runners in the state as he advances through the district and regional meets.

“He’ll be fine at district, he won’t have any trouble moving on. For some reason, a lot of the best runners (in Florida) seem to be in Class 3A,” he said. “It’s loaded.”

Liberty and Gateway compete at the 4A-4 meet at West Orange High Nov. 5 at 9:35 a.m. against strong squads from Colonial and Edgewater along with Freedom, Cypress Creek, Timber Creek, University and Winter Park.

“It’s tough this year because they moved us up to Class 4A, and we’re against some real strong programs. The boys should finish at least fourth,” Pauley said. “The exciting thing is that all of these kids are coming back. We’re excited about what we’ve done, and about next year.”

Poinciana will run at the 2A-7 meet Friday at 5 p.m. at Lake Nona.