Photo courtesy of Julie Shelby
HOT SPRINGS — The Bryant Lady Hornets competed in the Lake Hamilton Cross Country Invitational Saturday and[more] came away with a third place finish in the team competition. Rogers Heritage won the meet with 59 points followed by Van Buren with 77. Bryant scored 100 points with Lake Hamilton finishing fourth with 110 points. Little Rock Christian was fifth with 138 points. There were 28 teams and 239 individual runners in the varsity division.
Senior Hannah Raney and junior Melinda Murdock led the Lady Hornets. Raney finished in 10th place with a time of 20:11 with Murdock close behind in 14th place with a time of 20:18. Freshman Sarah Cowell was Bryant’s third finisher at 25th place in 20:49.
Finishing out the top five scorers were Caitlyn Bell (29th, 20:52) and freshman Hannah Shelby (36th, 21:12). Also competing were Lauren Ackley (68th, 22:34) and Talyn Billins (80th, 22:49).
“We did some really hard speed work this week and I think our legs were a little trashed for this meet,” noted Lady Hornets coach Danny Westbrook. “It’s that time of year that you have to race on dead legs to get ready for the big meets at the end of the season.
“I thought our freshmen Sarah Cowell and Hannah Shelby, who were running high school for the first time, had outstanding performances,” he added.
“We knew this meet would be huge since Oakland Park will be the site of the state meet in three weeks,” the coach mentioned. “We were hoping to beat Lake Hamilton and Little Rock Christian because they have beaten us in previous meets this season. We accomplished that, but we were surprised by the two 7A West schools, Heritage and Van Buren.”
Bryant’s next competition will be the 7A West Conference Championship Meet in Rogers on Oct. 30.
Junior Varsity
In the junior varsity race, the Lady Hornets took third place with 55 points. Haas Hall won the title with 30 points followed by Parkway, La., with 35 points. There were five teams and 64 total runners in the race.
Bryant was led by Marley Adams who finished seventh place in 23:29. Haylee Campbell took 14th place with a time of 24:51. The rest of the scorers were Randie Owens (16th, 24:54) Alanna Cordova (18th, 24:56), and Stephanie Cyz (20th, 25:03). Finishing out the top seven were Skylar Combs (24th, 25:22) and Mikayla Douglas (25th, 25:31).
