Season underway as starting gun goes off at UNM meet
The girls and boys crosscountry teams traveled to Albuquerque to take part in the UNM Lobo Invitational held at the UNM North Golf Course on Sept. 1. This year, the first meet of the season happened to take place a week later than usual due to the current fall sports calendar.
“Everything got pushed back by a week,” said Coach Bruce Gomez who is entering his 34th season as the harriers head coach. “So our training has been adjusted to fit within our meet schedule.”
The results were mixed for each of the boys and girls teams. The boys team came in 14th overall (out of 25 teams) with a total of 415 points.
As expected, the Albuquerque Academy boys team outpaced the field and finished with a staggering low total of 47 points. The Chargers were barely challenged by runner-up El Paso Americas, who finished with 86 points, and Los Alamos. who followed in third place with a score of 122 points. Pojoaque Valley – another team from District 2-4A who came out ahead of the Tigers – placed 11th with a team score of
326. The only other team from Taos’ league in attendance was the Española Valley Sundevils, who finished in 22nd place and garnered 627 points.
Top scorer for the boys was Zack Trujillo, who came in 57th place with a time of 18:06.50 followed closely by Eddie Duran who placed 64th with a time of
18.17.00. Other scoring Tigers included Adrian Rodriguez, Joe Trujillo and Elliot Moltz. Robert Lewis-Trujillo and Jonathan Evans came in 6th and 7th.
On the girls side, the Lady Tigers placed ninth (out of 23) as a team with a score of 260 points. And like the boys, Albuquerque Academy bested the competition registering a low score of
55 with all five of their scoring athletes crossing the finish line in the top 25.
Los Alamos was in high pursuit placing second overall with a team score of 60. Among participating class 4A teams, Taos finished in fourth place behind the Lady Chargers, Lady Hilltoppers and the Hope Christian Lady Huskies.
All four will now be competing against each other when they inevitably meet at the state meet in November. This race was a good gage of the competition.
Top scorers for the Lady Tigers included Alyx Master, who earned a 13th place with a time of 20:27.60. Ella Katz was the second runner for Taos, coming in 45th place with a time of 21:26.00. Katz was followed by Erin Manchester-Jones, who placed 48th with a time of 21:30.40, Cassandra Ruiz, who finished in the 64th spot with a time of 22:03.10, and Abigail Gunther, who rounded out the scorers for Taos in 96th place with a time of 23:22.80.
Extra points
Elizabeth Reyes, a former Lady Tigers cross-country star who graduated from Taos High School in 2017 and now runs with the UNM Women’s Lobo Team placed 24th in her division with a time of 19.50.90. Undoubtedly, she had her own personal cheering section in the women’s college 5K race.
Next up for the Taos Tigers and Lady Tigers is a 100-mile trip to the north to participate in the Joe Vigil Open hosted by Adam State University in Alamosa, Colorado. The event will take place at the Cattails Golf Course with the first race (middle school girls) starting at 8 a.m. Varsity boys take off at 9:20 a.m. and varsity girls will start at 10:25 a.m.