BELFAST — The Maine Principals’ Association cross country state meet will be held on Saturday — and three local schools will send their entire boys team to the event in Belfast.
Kennebunk, Massabesic and Thornton Academy all qualified for the meet by finishing in the top 9 of last week’s Southern Maine Class A regional.
The southern Maine teams are going into states with completely different mindsets.
Massabesic finished fourth in regionals and the Mustangs are hoping to place again at states.
“The expectation for states is that the boys are really going to work together, run together and pull each other through some tough parts of the race. They’re looking to keep their eyes on the Scarborough team, Mt. Ararat team and Deering team. We’re really hoping with all the work that we’ve done this year that we will see some great successes this weekend,” said Massabesic head coach Jennifer Blair. “The boys worked really hard all of their practices. We’ve got the top-seven finishers that we want crossing the line together.”
Massabesic fans should expect speedy miles from Jeffery Waters, Jesse Cadigan, Jakob Saucier, Elijah Karecki, Jakob Aboud, Matthew Pooler and Luke Cloutier.
Thornton Academy placed ninth in regionals and the Trojans are excited to participate in states.
“We only have two seniors who are going to be running on Saturday. I think it’s going to be a good chance for us to get some experience and hopefully we’ll be back next year.  Ultimately, if we go into the meet and everyone can walk away and say they had a good day then we’ll be pretty happy,” said Thornton Academy head coach Thomas Quentin.
The Mustangs had no issue qualifying for states with four of their top seven finishing in the top 30.
“Last weekend at regionals, Jeff (Waters) was in first for the first mile-and-a-half. He led the race and then fell off a little once the other teams kicked it in,” said Blair.
The Trojans feel lucky to be going to states after earning the last qualifying spot.
“You have to finish in the top half of the teams to move on and qualify for the state meet, which meant that we had to be in the top nine. In all honesty, we really didn’t think we ran that well on Saturday,” Quentin said. “There were a lot of spots where we thought that we could have done a bit better. One of the things about cross country is that it takes all seven of your runners and we had a couple guys step up pretty big and put us in a position to have a chance and we were able to finish ninth and move on.”
Big runs from Dawson Desrosiers, Parker Redlon and Lucas Judice scored the last qualifying spot for the Trojans.
“Our top runner was Dawson Desrosiers who finished 10th. I thought he could finish somewhere around there but he could have had a perfectly fine day and ended up being five or eight spots back. Parker Redlon, who is a junior on our team, ended up finishing well compared to how he’s done relative to his teammates throughout the year. He stepped it up big for us. Lucas Judice, who is a senior on the team, ended up being our fifth guy and he stepped it up as well,” said Quentin.
Runners will have to deal with the course at Troy Howard High School in Belfast.
“We don’t run there very often. I think we have one maybe two kids on the team who have ever run there but it’s a pretty flat and fast course. They have the state meet there every other year. I think when they have the state meet there, people are excited to be able to go and run a fast course,” said Quentin.
Blair believes the Belfast course will provide a test for her team.
“The course puts us all at an even playing field. When the boys talk about how flat and fast that is, I just remind them that everyone is running that same flat and fast course. We actually tend to excel in really hilly courses because that’s what we practice day in and day out. We have to work extra hard on the flat courses to really show our strengths because all the teams are good at flat courses,” said Blair.
NOTES: Kennebunk will be led by Ethan Eickmann and Garrett Erickson-Harris at the state meet The Rams will also send their entire girls squad to the event. Leading the way will be Hannah D’Orso, Abi Lamontagne and Ella Boxall … Massabesic’s Kylie Johnson will also be competing in the state championship on Saturday … Biddeford senior Sam Mills qualified as an individual for the boys race.
— Sports Writer Sienna Barstow can be reached at sbarstow@journaltribune.com or at 780-9018. Follow the Journal Tribune Sports Department on Twitter @JournalTsports.