ST. LOUIS – O’Fallon (IL) got a boost from Patrick Perrier’s record-setting victory Saturday in the Green Division of the Forest Park Cross Country Festival, but it was the team’s depth that allowed the Panthers to capture first place.
The Panthers scored three in the top 20 and had all five scoring runners in the top 62 to repeat as meet champs with 125 points.
“This meet has the best competition that Missouri has to offer, so to come over here and beat programs like Rock Bridge or Lafayette or St. Louis U. High, it means a lot to us,” O’Fallon coach Jon Burnett said. “Our big goal is at the very end of the season, and everything along the way is just steps, and there are positives and negatives at every meet we go to.”
It was not the run-away victory of last year when the Panthers tallied a 75-point victory over Rock Bridge by amassing 66 points. It does reveal just how strong of a program O’Fallon has built, and it could mean another strong postseason run for the team that placed second at the Illinois 3A state meet last year.
Rock Bridge was the runner-up for the second consecutive year with 157 points, edging Lafayette by two points. The Bruins were led by senior Evan Schulte in seventh (15:33) and had a team split of 1:22.
“We felt like if we were even in the same stadium as O’Fallon we were doing well,” Rock Bridge coach Neal Blackburn said. “I feel pretty good about scoring as we did today. We’re still not quite where I’d like us to be. It was a fast course, and I felt like we stepped up and met that challenge today.”
Rock Bridge will score more with a pack than in years past. After Schulte, Blackburn said he is looking for the rest of the scoring Bruins to cluster together and work as a unit.
“We expect 2-5, 2-6 to have a very, very quick spread – better than anything we’ve had the last five or six years,” Blackburn said. “We feel like if we can achieve that, stay together and race and stay in contact, that we can be a pretty good opponent.”
Rock Bridge was seventh in the Missouri Class 4 state meet last year after winning the title in 2011. The victory was aided by Caleb Wilfong’s individual title, but the team also bonded into a tight-knit unit. Last year’s team could not recapture the same unity, but Blackburn said he is seeing more harmony again this year.
“This year our senior leadership is kind of taking those guys under their wings, and they’ve built that camaraderie, and I think there’s a lot more just love for one another,” Blackburn said. “Through that, and a lot of summer training together, and workouts – we’re right there. Everybody has a partner and our spread in workouts is real quick.”
In the White Division, Platte County took home the top trophy with 129 points. Francis Howell North was runner-up with 205 points, just four points ahead of third-place Priory (209).
