Defending champ missing top 4 girls

Tri-State Sports & News Service

After last season, it appeared the Seneca Valley girls cross country team would be a shoo-in to win its third consecutive WPIAL 3A title and might even have a chance at the first state championship in school history.

Now, however, those two WPIAL titles are a distant memory and a third crown might not be in the cards.

In the offseason, the top four runners from last season’s team, seniors Rachel Hensler, Mariah Mack, Isabelle Blasé and Julia Kooser, opted not to come out for the team for various undisclosed reasons. Without them, the Raiders finished eighth in the 14th Red, White and Blue Invi- tational Saturday, the annual precursor for the start of the regular season.

“We definitely have a new look this season and we have a lot of new kids on the team,” Seneca Valley coach Steve Strelick said. “It’s still very early yet and it’s hard to tell.”

Without the four who didn’t return including Hensler, who finished second to Oakland Catholic’s Lauren Finikiotis in the WPIAL 3A individual standings last year at Cooper’s Lake, the Raiders were led at the Schenley Oval by senior Emma Lizewski, the team’s top returner from a year ago, who ran a 20:53.2 and finished in 31st. Lizewski was 24th in the WPIAL last season and finished fifth on the team.

“You’ve always got to be in the moment and you’ve got to run with what you have and who you are and don’t compare yourself to the past because it’s a lot of pressure,” Strelick said. “There’s a lot of anxiety trying to reproduce what was, but all you can do is worry about right now.”

Despite not having those four runners back, Seneca Valley will still be competitive, even if the expectations might not be as high.

“I just have to listen to them and what they have to say after the workouts,” Strelick said. “We have to make sure that we do enough and not too much as we walk the fine line between underdoing and overdoing it and focus on speed and sharpening up a little bit.”

Winchester Thurston

A year ago, Winchester Thurston had three of the top 10 runners in the state at the PIAA 1A finals, yet even with those high placements, it was only able to finish tied for third with Northeast Bradford in the overall team standings.

This year, though, the Bears have six of their seven runners back and might be ready to make a move on defending WPIAL champion and PIAA runner-up Sewickley Academy for regional supremacy. On Saturday, they made their first statement to that effect as they finished with 28 points in winning the 1A division of the Red, White and Blue Invitational with the Panthers firmly ensconced in 10th.

“It’s a great way to start the season, but we’ve shined in this race in past Septembers and we’re just trying to carry this out into October and November,” Winchester Thurston coach Bruce Frey said. “It’s a veteran team … and we’re obviously satisfied with this start.”

It also helped that junior Tristan Forsythe, who ran most of last season with appendicitis, is back at full strength and won the 2A/1A race in 16:20.3, 2.4 seconds ahead of Greensburg Salem’s Mark Brown. With an inflamed side last year he was fourth in the WPIAL with a 16:48 and ran the PIAA course in 17:03 and finished seventh.

Vincentian

There is no specific timetable for the return of Vincentian senior and three-time reigning WPIAL and PIAA champion Marianne Abdalah from a right leg injury that has her on the shelf for at least the next week.

That being said, there is cautious optimism that she could be running by the beginning of October.

“She’s keeping her strength up and keeping her cardio up and, she’s not going to race right away, but I think she can come back a week or so before WPIALs just to get a race in before that,” Vincentian coach Dan Carlino said. “We have an invite on Oct. 8 if she’s OK, which is a couple weeks before WPIALs and we’ll do some time-trial stuff away from everyone else just to see if she’s ready.”

Without her, the Royals won the 1A division of the Red, White and Blue Invitational thanks in large part to sophomore Katherine Fedko, who won the 2A/1A individual race in 19:40.6. With her leading the way, Vincentian finished with 35 points, 54 better than second place Our Lady of the Sacred Heart.

“We only had six girls in that race and they really stepped up,” Carlino said. “I’m really proud of them and it gives them a lot of confidence.”