ROGERS — Running against the cross country teams in the 7A-West for the first time[more] as an adjunct member, the Bryant Hornets were competing against teams that are perennially among the best in the state. When you compete in the West, it's like a State meet.
Finishing fifth in that league is a whole lot different than finishing fifth in any other.
On Tuesday, that's right where the Hornets wound up at the league championship meet at Rogers High School. In the eight-team meet, Bryant wound up scoring 147 points.
Bentonville won the meet with a score of 33, followed by Rogers (47), Har-Ber (48), and Rogers Heritage (119).
"We didn't have a great meet, but I was glad we held on to fifth place,” said Hornets coach Steve Oury. “Fayetteville was only 3 points behind us. I was hoping we could sneak in to the fourth spot ahead of Heritage, but we couldn't quite close the gap on them."
Freshman Charlie Terry paced the Hornets with a 15th place finish in a time of 17:14. The remainder of the top seven runners were Tyler Purtle (32nd in 17:43), Connor Wilson (33rd in 17:43), Clifton Hampton (42nd in 18:01), Nicholas Schmidt (53rd in 18:19), Dru Wen (54th in 18:19), and Jim Dellorto (57th in 18:24).
“Connor Wilson was sitting in 10th place with a half-mile to go and cramped up,” Oury related. “He showed a lot of courage in finishing the race. Charlie Terry ran a solid race, as did Tyler Purtle.
“The competition was extremely tough, just as we thought it would be,” he concluded. “This will help us in our preparation for the State meet on Nov. 10 in Hot Springs."
