Unioto High School swept the Scioto Valley Conference cross country championships at Adena High School on October 17, winning both the boys and girls team titles, while Chillicothe’s boys and girls each finished second in the Frontier Athletic Conference meet. The Shermans’ boys won their 12th straight league championship, and the girls claimed their sixth consecutive title, according to results reported by the Chillicothe Gazette.
The boys race was a sweep at the front as well as in the standings. Corbin Scott won in 16:06.4, and teammates Ethan Purtee, William Lynch, Rudy Leadingham and Jayden Lewis followed in second through fifth, giving Unioto the top five finishers and a perfect team score of 15. Eli Good, Cameron Caplinger and Justus Race added seventh, eighth and 10th-place finishes for the Shermans.
Adena’s Carter Elliott finished sixth in 17:46.6 on his home course, and Piketon’s Emmitt Wallace was ninth in 17:52.6, the only runners to break up the Unioto pack in the top 10. Behind Unioto, the boys team order was Westfall with 74 points, Adena 78, Piketon 109, Paint Valley 142, Zane Trace 148 and Huntington 149.
In the girls race, Huntington’s Rachel Lute was the individual winner in 21:28.7, ahead of Zane Trace’s Carli Wireman in 21:34.0 and Paint Valley’s Kiya Weaver in 21:50.4. Unioto took the next three places through Caroline Scott, Alex McDonald and Ellen Slack, and added Jordynn Cochenour in 10th to secure the team title.
The girls team scores were Unioto 35, Paint Valley 66, Zane Trace 70, Huntington 93 and Westfall 95. Paint Valley’s Evie Sharp finished seventh, Adena’s Raeley Stephenson eighth and Zane Trace’s Madilynn Snider ninth to complete the top 10 in a race where Unioto’s depth, rather than the individual win, decided the championship.
In the Frontier Athletic Conference, Chillicothe’s boys and girls each earned second-place team finishes, a strong showing for the Cavaliers against the league’s best on championship weekend. Full results from the SVC meet are posted through SEOTiming, the timing provider for the races at Adena.
The league meets now turn the area’s runners toward the postseason, with district competition next on the schedule. Unioto enters it as the SVC’s standard-bearer on both sides, having extended streaks that now run to 12 years for the boys and six for the girls, while Chillicothe carries its pair of FAC runner-up finishes into the same next round.
Photo: Harrison Keely, CC BY