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Ava Cross Country at Mtn. Grove

The Ava cross country team loaded up and traveled the quick trip to the Randel Hinkel golf course at Mtn Grove last Thursday, Oct. 17, for a 15-school meet.
In the boys’ varsity race, Caleb Stillings came in second overall to Mtn. Grove’s John Burd finishing just 2 seconds behind Burd with a time of 17:08.
Jordan Dimirsky came in next for the Bears, finishing in 18:02 and earning a medal by placing 11th.
Jacob Luebbering finished in 18th and also medaled with a time of 18:37.  Hayden Schuster finished in a time of 20:41, John Vineyard followed in 20:43, Sage Clunn had 20:47 and Garrit Swainston clocked a time of 22:42.
Each of the Ava boys had their 2nd-best times of the season.
As a team Ava finished in fourth place with a score of 86 points.  West Plains won the meet scoring 28 points.  Mountain Grove was second with 77 points, Plato third had 80 points.  Behind Ava’s fourth place finish were Licking with 122 points and Norwood scoring 131.  The other nine schools did not have full teams to score.
In the girls varsity race, Bailey Ray set her fifth personal best in a row with a time of 23:06, which was 57 seconds faster than last week at Springfield Catholic.  Bailey finished 13th overall.  Megan Cooper finished 18th in a time of 24:09, a personal best for her by 20 seconds.  Megan and Bailey both medaled.
Kayla Cooper finished in 25:01 Madison Schuster ran the course in 29:07 and Julianna Baker finished in 29:54, tying her best time of the season. West Plains girls won the meet with a perfect score of 15, placing all five of their runners in the first five positions.  Mansfield took second with 70 points behind Adrian Adams’ 23:03 finish.  Plato had 73 points with Lexie McNeil running top position for them in 21:10.  Lexie was the Class 1 state champion in 2012. Ava Lady Bears came in fourth with 87 points.
In the junior varsity boys’ race, both Brett Mitchell and Jonah Brown had their best times of the season, with each medaling.  Brett finished in 11th place with a time of 9:42.  Jonah placed 15th in a time of 9:58.  Both boys ran the course two weeks ago and improved their times by 45 seconds for Brett and 38 seconds for Jonah.
In the junior high races, a distance of 1½ miles, Braden Swofford placed fifth with a determined last one-half mile finish where he passed 10 runners.  Braden ran the course in 9:26, an improvement for him by 20 seconds over the last meet held at Mtn. Grove.
Jacob Key ran a 10:18 and was 46 seconds faster than his last attempt at Mtn. Grove.  Gavin Goss ran his personal best with a time of 12:42 improving by 59 seconds.
Aubrey Schuster also had her best time of the season with a 10:12, which bettered her time by 55 seconds.  Darci Ray ran her best of the season beating her last Mtn Grove time by 1 minute 6 seconds and finishing in 10:58.
Four Ava 6th grade girls competed in the younger grades race.  Eden Little ran a 10:44 for her first endeavor at cross country.  Claire Fossett ran a 10:59 an improvement over her last attempt by 21 seconds.  Olivia Heriford also gave it another try and improved her time by 5:46 seconds, running an 11:33
And Sydney Snelson also back again ran a 12:11 to improve her time by 5:12 from two weeks ago.
Senior night was held Monday, Oct. 28, at the Ava Country Club golf course. This was the final meet of the season before the district meet which will be held Saturday, Nov. 2, at Willow Springs.