At the McCullough-Douglass Invitational, Rockhurst's 800 and 3200 champions, Bill Hayes and Henry Acorn told MileSplit their goal was to run in the Penn Relays 4x800 later in the season.
That day has arrived, and the Rockhurst boys are ready to go after the nearly 9-year-old State record held by Lafayette (Wildwood) on Thursday morning. Their race will take place at 8:20 a.m. CT.
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For nearly 35 years, the University City Lions sat atop the all-time state leaderboard with their 7:42.09 mark. Each year, teams would arrive at meets across the country or at the pinnacle of the season, the State Championships, hoping to knock them off the top spot. Each year, the best of the best of the state had to offer would fall just short.
Lee's Summit came close in 1986, but settled for a 7:44.32. West Plains' best squad turned in a 7:44.56 in 2002. Liberty ran 7:45.48 in 2004. No one could seem to put together the 1:55.5 average it would take to take down University City.
Until 2016.
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Enter the 2016 Lafayette Lancers. A team many believe to be the state's all-time most impressive cross country team in 2015, scoring 38 points at the Class 4 State Championships and finishing the season with a 15:22.92 1-5 team average, Lafayette was on a crash course to glory at the 2016 State Track and Field Championships.
At the 2016 state meet, the team of Alec Haines (1:55.44), Austin Hindman (1:53.96), Devin Meyrer (1:57.40), and Dylan Quisenberry (1:53.47), not only broke University City's record, but did it in the most impressive way by possible: solo.
Haines handed off to Hindman 3 seconds ahead of the rest of the field. Hindman's soul-crushing split pushed the lead to 8 seconds when he handed off to Meyrer. The following 1:57 split, 2 seconds slower than the next slowest of his team's splits, was still good enough to push the lead to 13 seconds before handing off to one of the state's premier middle-distance runners at the time. Quisenberry sealed the deal with an eye-popping 1:53.47 split - once again, solo - and crossed the line in 7:40.29, nearly making his squad the first Missouri team to ever break 7:40.
They won that race by 16 seconds.
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Bill Hayes
Since then, distance running has exploded. Each year, teams and athletes have pushed the boundary of what we previously thought possible in the state. While others around the country may consider the times we have witnessed lately normal or commonplace, they are signs in Missouri that distance running has arrived in our state.
Jacob Bond
The Rockhurst Hawklets have since also gone under University City's mark, pushing them up to No. 2 all-time. Last year, in fact, Rockhurst accomplished that feat with four athletes who would be back for the 2025 season.
Henry Acorn and Andrew Davis
The team of Hayes, Jacob Bond, Acorn, and Andrew Davis ran 7:42.06, holding off Liberty North (7:42.17) and dipping under the former mark. Hayes ran a 1:55.51 split, Bond 1:59.47, and Acorn and Davis followed with respective 1:53.72 and 1:53.17 splits - marks which were necessary given the race Libery North's anchor Kaden Kleinhen gave them.
Andrew Davis and Kaden Kleinhen
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So Rockhurst heads up to the Penn Relays on Thursday to go after yet another "never-been-done-before" accolade for a Missouri team: break 7:40 in the 4x800 meter relay.
And they have a very good shot at it.
So far this season, Bond has matched that split from last season in his open race, and improved upon his 1600 time by 23 seconds. He has also run 51.41 in the open 400.
Acorn has kicked off his season with a bang, holding the top spot in all three distance events at this point, with 1:54.39, 4:15.32, and 9:01.93 marks so far.
Hayes pulled in a win at the McCullough-Douglass Invitational in the 800 in 1:55.72 and followed it up with 1:56.87 and 4:21.18 performances at the Bill Summa Invitational. He ran 1:53.70 in the open 800 last season.
Davis, the reigning 800 state champion, has not had the same start to his season as his teammates. He has run 50.52 in the 400 and 2:00.75 in the 800 so far, and has a 1:52.38 lifetime best to his name.
The Hawklets will race at 8:20am central, live on FloTrack, in the third heat. The US No. 19 team at the moment with their 7:48.92 season best will be running against one other team in the top 20: US No. 16 Union Catholic (NJ). But their heat is chock-full of some of the top overall teams in the country, and even Jamaica.
Should they finish in the top 12 among the teams in the 4 preliminary heats, they will compete on Friday in the "Championship of America" finals.