Cross country heads to Bryson City for Keith Payne Memorial meet
Bryson City – All four Cherokee County varsity cross-country teams traveled to Swain County to compete in the Keith Payne Memorial Invitational meet.
The varsity boys hit the 5-kilometer – or 3 mile – course first Saturday morning. With a time of 16:25.97, Oscar Page of Hiwassee Dam secured another cross-country win. He finished 35 seconds faster than the second-place finisher.
Three other Cherokee Country boys runners finished in the top 10. Elliott Salinas of Andrews came in fourth place, Myca Mustin of Andrews came in ninth and Maverick Hawley came in 10th.
In boys team scores, Hiwassee Dam came in fifth and Andrews came in sixth.
Also scoring for the Eagles were Xavier Johnson in 26th place, Travis Allen in 54th place and Brandon Bishop in 73rd place.
Also scoring for the Wildcats were Jayce Donaldson in 13th place, Ethan Garrett in 91st and Ford Ashe in 96th.
Murphy runners who competed Saturday were Braden Edwards in 19th place, Josiah Niblea in 50th and Cruz Yarbro in 51st.
From Tri-County, Joshua Bickham came in 52nd place, Anthony DaSilva came in 66th, Daniel Bickham came in 71st and Leo Henningfeld came in 74th.
Murphy and Tri-County didn’t not have the five runners required to score team points.
The varsity girls were up next following the completion of the boys race.
Fern Crayton of Tri-County was the only Cherokee County girls runner to finish in the top 10. She came in fifth with a time of 20:07.6.
Tri-County was also the only Cherokee County team to score team points. The Jaguars came in sixth with 137 points. Also running for Tri-County was Bryanna Jaime in 30th place, Genevieve Gelabert in 59th, Noel Nickell in 60th and Emma Watson in 62nd.
Murphy had three girls runners who finished within 30 seconds of each other. Anna Leatherwood came in 43rd with a time of 28:08.56, Hadley Rider came in 44th with a time of 28:26.25 and Emory Ricks came in 47th with a time of 28:38.25.
Hiwassee Dam also had three girls runners. Avery Freemon came in 42nd, Kaitlyn Lecoq came in 50th and Ashlin Anderson came in 61st.
Andrews did not have any girls runners.
Up next
Cross country will return to Cherokee County as Murphy High School will host the next meet. The Bulldog XC open will host teams from the Smoky Mountain Conference and from around the region.
The race will begin on Gentry Field at Bob Hendrix Stadium and will wrap up at the Roberson-Pipes track & field complex parking lot.
The meet will start at 8 a.m. Saturday with middle school boys, followed by middle school girls around 8:30 a.m. High school boys will start about 9 a.m., followed by high school girls at about 9:30 a.m.
Times are approximate due to the next race starting following the completion of the previous one.