(Photo: Greg Hall)
5. Liberty
Location: Liberty, MO
Enrollment: 1767
Class: 4
Head Coach: Tim Nixon
2016 District (Place): 8 (4th)
2016 Sectional (Place): 4 (8th)
2016 State Place: NTS
Key Returners: Ryan Flood (1), Daniel Garrison (3), Ryan Mata (4), Riley Brookins (5), Logan Bly (6), Darryl Gichui (7)
Eighth place at the sectional meet usually means one of three things: (1) your boys just had a bad day, (2) your district was weaker than the other one, or (3) you have some young potential that needed one more year of seasoning. With Liberty, we see the 3rd one. They may have lost their #2, Max Martin, but they will return C4 #8 Ryan Flood and a host of other solid runners behind him. Flood returns with a 16:00 PR from the state meet, good for 12th, and grabbed a 7th place medal in the C5 1600 on the track. Liberty's new #2-5 all come in within 26 seconds of each other - between 17:02 and 17:28 - and will surely create a strong pack behind Flood. We need to be especially alert of Ryan Mata who ran 9:56 as a freshman this past spring. KCMO is stacked on the boys and girls sides, but Liberty could make a surprise run at Top 4 out of Sectional 4 and make a trip back to state after going each of the past 3 seasons and 17 of the last 18.