Benton Central Jr-Sr High School

The culmination of the fall sports season is the State Tournament. Benton Central’s Cross Country teams have high hopes for a strong showing this year. All runners advanced through the first round and into the Regionals meet held Saturday at New Prairie High School. An exciting atmosphere, nationally ranked course, and a trip to the State meet was on the line and the Bison had specific goals in mind. For some, that goal was to set a new Personal Record, for others, advance to State. At the end of the day, we had a State Qualifier and a new school record. Lillian Weigle does it again, with another spectacular performance. The freshman ran a smart, methodical race from the start, slowly eating up positions to fourth place and punched her ticket to State! Her efforts also led to a new Personal Best time of 18:11.46, breaking her own School Record by a second on this notoriously difficult course. Her teammate Harlo Holder also ran a great race, narrowly falling short of State in her own right. Our boys’ raced together for the last time. While none of the boys set best times, they went out as a team and raced to the finish. We thank all our boys for an amazing season. Our top boys, Matthew McKinnis and Sam Fleming also ran their way into the record books. These seniors have the 5th and 7th fastest PRs and 3rd and 4th lowest average times for the last 5 meets of the season in the last 9 years, respectively. A bittersweet ending to the season for most of our runners, but the season is not over for the Bison Cross Country team. Lillian travels to the prestigious LaVern Gibson Cross Country Course in Terre Haute to face off against the best runners in the State. Top 25 earn the right to All-State recognition. We thank all of those runners who had their season come to a conclusion and wish them the best in their winter activities.