cross-country eagles earn another state bid

For the second straight year the Seymour Eagles boys cross-country track team will put their skills on display at the state tournament.

The Eagles earned their second bid to the coveted state tourney by virtue of a third-place finish at last Thursday’s A/AA Region-2 track meet at Victor Ashe Park in Knoxville.

SHS freshman Mariah Melancon gave the Lady Eagles a representative at the Big Dance by finishing 8^th in the girls’ competition.

The top 10 individual finishers in both the boys and girls competitions earn bids to the state tournament whereas just the top three teams earn a shot to compete for the state championship.

The Eagles were led by senior standout Ryan Pierce, who finished third in the regional field. Freshman Luke Hall came in ninth-place overall and fellow ninth-grader Logan Sims legged out a 20^th place individual finish for Seymour.

Each state tournament representative is allowed to take seven competitors along to the state event, which is slated to begin Saturday in Nashville.

Allen confirmed that the Eagles will take Pierce, Hall, Sims, Stephen Dickison, Karl Hosler, Billy Taylor and Shawn McAward to the state competition. Melancon will be the lone Lady Eagles representative competing at the event.

The Seymour girls’ team probably feels fortunate to even be in the mix after losing two-time region champion Stephanie Moore to graduation last year.

“You don’t replace somebody like Stephanie Moore,” said SHS cross-country head coach Richard Allen. “She won the region twice and ran in the state the last two years.

“It was nice to see Mariah perform so well at the region meet though,” he added. “She really deserves it. She’s put a lot of time and effort into it. Mariah transferred (to Seymour High School) late but has worked to get better and has shown a lot of improvement as the season has gone along.”

Allen went on to say the unique mix of seniors and freshmen that make up the 2007 Eagles squad is actually working out very well for both the present and the future.

“Our three seniors—Pierce, Hosler, McAward—give us very good senior leadership but we also have some younger runners who are making an impact,” Allen noted.

“Since the seniors went to the state tournament last year it should give us a comfort level, having already been there and seen how it happens,” he added.

“The younger runners give us confidence for the future. Now they know it can be done. We have some good young runners and good senior leadership on this team.”

Allen added that earning the bid to the state tournament is not a feat that occurs over night.

“The kids deserve a lot of credit for making it back to Nashville,” he observed. “Our quest to get to the state started a long time before (Thursday’s regional meet). It started during the off-season with conditioning and the athletes showing that they wanted to get back there again.”

The Eagles finished in the same position at the 2006 region meet but failed to make a serious run at the grand prize once they arrived at the state event.

Allen says the competition at the state level is quite daunting.

“The private schools have been so dominant in recent years,” he explained. “We’re going in with the goal of finishing in the top half of our field. We’d like to improve on last year’s performance.”

The Eagles finished behind first place Catholic and second place Gibbs Thursday at the regional meet. Seymour beat out fourth-place Stone Memorial by 30 points to claim the coveted state tournament bid.