Wildcats third; Lady Cats fourth

With less than 50 yards before the finish line, Clovis sophomore Colton Dant had a Hobbs runner in his sight as the cross country season opened for several schools at Ned Houk Park.

Fighting all the way through to the end, Dant caught his Eagles’ counterpart and barely nipped him to win his own personal battle.

No, that wasn’t for first place in Friday’s varsity race. In fact, Dant was only 15th overall — but it was exactly what Clovis coach Mike Hankins was looking for from his squad.

“I’m real happy about where we finished today. We kind of set little goals for ourselves. We’re not worried about winning the races right now; we just want to improve upon where we were last year,” Hankins said.

Clovis finished third in the team standings for the boys varsity race behind Hobbs and Rio Rancho.

In the girls race, Rio Rancho was the overall winner — ahead of Hereford, Carlsbad and Clovis.

Lubbock Coronado’s Donovan Torres was the boys individual winner while Roswell freshman Anna Olesinski was the girls victor.

The best finisher for the Wildcat boys was senior Justin Netcher, who finished eighth place with a time 16 minutes and 53 seconds. Not long after, fellow Clovis senior Justin Kyle took 10th in 17:04.

Three more ’Cats runners ended up in the top 20: junior Ben Reed at 17:14 for 12th, Dant at 15th with a time of 17:17 and junior Jaron Morgan in 17th at 17:28.

“They came out and competed. One of the things I’ve emphasized is, when we finish the race, are we going backwards or are we passing people,” Hankins said. “We working hard at the end of the race today.”

And Dant’s run?

“That’s exactly what I’m talking about,” the Clovis coach said.

In the girls race, standout Caitlin Waters — defending state champ in the 800 meters — fell behind a group of seven racers within the first quarter-of-a-mile. Although running a solitary race from that point on, Waters bettered her time at the Ned Houk Park course from the same event last year and finished eighth.

Juniors Tara Dewitt and Anica Chairez were 23rd and 24th overall, finishing respectively at 21:39 and 21:40. Freshman Kyra Bussen crossed a minute later (22:40) for 38th position and fellow ninth-grader Gladys Miranda ended her run nine seconds later for 40th.

“I think I did a lot better. My time was a lot better,” said Waters, who finished in 20:07. “I actually came in right behind the Castillo girls (twins Brandy and Brittany, from Carlsbad), which was a really big deal to me. I got caught between two packs, so I was kind of just running by myself.”

“She’s just a great athlete and what’s neat about her is that there’s still room for improvement,” Hankins said. “One of the things I’ve been fighting her about is, at the beginning, her thinking she’ll leave it on the course and not be able to finish.

“I’ve got to get her to the same point where she is in the spring when she runs the half (-mile),” he added. “She’s got to trust her conditioning and trust where she’s at — and realize that she can tag on to that front group. If you want to get to the last 200 meters of a race, I’ll race Caitlin against anybody.”