MEDFORD CROSS COUNTRY - Girls, Kahn defend home course, earn race wins at Northland Pines

MEDFORD CROSS COUNTRY

The Medford girls made it two wins in two meets and Lindsay Kahn did the same individually at Tuesday’s Northland Pines Cross Country Invitational.

The Raiders’ third team win of the fall came with an eight-point margin over Great Northern Conference rival Lakeland, 49-57, while Rhinelander was 13 points behind on the course that is set to host the GNC championships on Saturday, Oct. 19.

Medford’s boys placed third in Tuesday’s 11-team meet, scoring 97 points to trail Rhinelander (42) and Lakeland (50).

“The Northland Pines Invite was a great opportunity to preview the conference course,” Medford head coach Jake Rhyner said. “The girls and boys continue to work hard and the results are showing.”

Kahn won the girls race in 20:06.8, beating Crandon’s Addison May by 18.1 seconds. Lakeland’s Stella Meza (20:54.6) and Sherri Handeland (21:16.7) were third and fourth.

“Lindsay Kahn ran a great race, taking the lead at mile two and enjoying an 18second margin of victory,” Rhyner said. “She ran smart and gets the win two weeks in a row.”

Morgan Liske earned a seventh-place medal for Medford at a season-best 21:24.3, while Mallory Richter (22:47.9), Ella Dassow (22:53.3) and Willow Dassow (23:04.8) closed the scoring by taking 12th, 15th and 18th in a field of 66 runners.

“Runners three through five did an incredible job securing the team win,” Rhyner said of Richter and the Dassows. “Lakeland had three girls in the top 10, but these girls put us in position to secure the win.”

Carly Koski was 21st for Medford in a personal-best 23:33.1 and Greta Seidel was right behind her at 23:37.1, also her best time. Kayla Daniels set her best time of the fall at 23:57.7, good for 27th. Esmeralda Anderson was 38th at 25:00.5, Lauren Stark was 43rd in a season-best 25:27.9 and Lexi Hraby was 50th in a personal-best 26:56.5. Isabella Leischer was 63rd at 31:24.6.

Three Lakes finished fourth in the team standings with 91 points, followed by Northland Pines (122), Antigo (138) and Florence-Niagara (187). Crandon, Laona-Wabeno, Hurley and Merrill were incomplete.

Senior Brandon Curtis came up just short of earning a top-10 medal, finishing 12th in 18:07.6. Northland Pines’ Jason Linn got the 10th medal with his time of 18:04.8. Crandon’s Taylor Karcz won the race in 16:01.5, well ahead of Three Lakes’ Nolan Waltz (16:26), Lakeland’s Ashton Bremer (16:42.3) and Rhinelander’s Avrom Barr (16:51.5).

Medford, though, got season-best times from the majority of its runners.

Corbyn Radlinger led that list, taking 21st in 19:00.1. Evan Pagel was 26th in a season-best 19:25.5, while Jordan Lavin, Peyton Ried and Will Daniels all hit the finish line in 19:26 for their best times of 2024. Ace Arndt’s new best time of 19:32.2 put him 32nd out of 84 runners.

Hudson Briggs was 45th in 20:26.1, a 33-second improvement over his last meet. Angus Hamland was 53rd in 20:52.7, Nevyn Gripentrog placed 65th in a season-best 21:50.2, and Manny Espinoza cut 75 seconds, taking 72nd in 22:34.2. Isiah Wallace-Syzdel was 74th at his best time of 22:44.7, Corbyn Fuchs was 75th at 22:59.3 and Isaac Damm was 81st in 28:51.2.

Crandon was fourth with 132 points, followed by Laona-Wabeno (137), Northland Pines (138), Merrill (164) and Antigo (183). Three Lakes, Florence-Niagara and Hurley were incomplete.

Before returning to Eagle River next weekend for the conference meet, Medford will head south this Saturday for the Wisconsin Dells Invitational. The meet starts at 10 a.m. at Christmas Mountain Resort.

Medford Invite

The home course is known as a fast one that can produce some good times and that was the case Thursday when the girls placed first and the boys took third in a five-team meet.

The girls won the team trophy by capturing the sixth-runner tiebreaker over Ashland. Both teams scored 38 points. The Raiders were led by Kahn, who pulled ahead of the pack in the first 100 meters and was never challenged after that while finishing in 20:17.5, which was about 52 seconds faster than last year’s Medford race.

Seidel sealed the team title for Medford as the tiebreaking sixth team finisher. Finishing 16th in 23:51.2, the freshman beat the 17th-place finisher and Ashland’s sixth runner, Natalie Bybee, by 12.3 seconds.

In between, the Raiders got solid runs out of Liske and Richter, who were fourth and fifth in 22:16.1 and 22:23.1, respectively. Ella Dassow and Willow Dassow played key roles in the team win by picking off opponent runners in the late stages. Ella was 13th in 23:23.8 and Willow was 15th in a season-best time of 23:23.3.

Anderson was not far from scoring, taking 20th for Medford in a season-best 24:18.3 and Koski was right behind her, taking 21st in 24:30.9. Daniels was 29th out of 48 runners in 24:48.8, her best time of 2024 and an improvement of 1:12 from last year.

Ashland’s Grace Swanson was the race runner-up 20:55.8 and Rhinelander’s Brynn Teter was third in 21:49.5. Rhinelander finished third in the team standings with 52 points, Northland Pines had 104 and Merrill was incomplete.

Stark was 39th for Medford in a season-best 26:37.2. Hraby was 45th in 29:19.3, Amy Espinoza lowered her time to 30:32.6 while taking 46th and Leischer lowered her personal best by more than three minutes while taking 48th in 30:52.3.

Curtis earned a top-10 medal and was about 1:38 faster than last year while placing sixth out of 46 runners in Thursday’s boys race.

Curtis finished in 18:08.1, six seconds off his best time of the season, which was recorded Sept. 3 at the Mosinee Invite. He was 4.5 seconds behind fifth-place finisher Brody Kowieski of Rhinelander. The Hodags had three of the top five finishers to win the meet with 31 points. They were well ahead of Ashland (55), Medford (70), Northland Pines (102) and Merrill (104).

Ashland’s Tristan Blancarte won the race in 16:27.8, followed by Rhinelander’s Greyson Gremban (16:46.9) and Barr (17:17.3) and Ashland’s Dylan Blancarte (17:44.3).

The gap between Medford’s second and fifth scorers closed to just seven seconds. Radlinger took 14th in 19:33.8, just 0.4 seconds ahead of Ried. Lavin improved by 59 seconds over last year and took 17th in a personal-best 19:37.5 and Arndt was 18th in 19:40.1, beating his previous best time by 30 seconds.

Pagel was 20th for Medford in 20:21.5, beating last year’s Medford time by 1:25. Will Daniels was 22nd in 20:28.1 and Ayden Tyznik was 23rd in a season-best 20:30.1. Another season-best run came from Hamland, who took 26th in 20:39.9. Briggs competed in his first race of the fall and was 30th in 20:59.6. Gripentrog was 38th at 22:36.3, Fuchs was 43rd at 23:48.3 and Espinoza was 44th in a personal-best 23:49.3.

Both of Medford’s middle school teams finished second in the team standings, nine points behind Marshfield.

The boys were outscored by the Tigers 36-45 and were 55 points better than third-place Tomahawk. Medford’s scorers finished in a pack in places seven through 11. They were Parker Ried (13:07.9), Tanner Gebauer (13:08.4), Jett Jones (13:15.1), Oliver Daniels (13:17.9) and Sawyer Seidl (13:26.7).

The girls were outscored by Marshfield 39-48 and were 23 points better than third-place Antigo. Melanie Richter was third 13:39.2, Taytem Brahmer was ninth in 14:17.9, Marcella Svejda was 10th in 14:18.3, Kyra Scheithauer took 14th in 15:29.9 and Layla Laduron placed 20th in 15:41.6.

Lindsay Kahn (l.) is well in front of the girls pack midway through that race during Thursday’s Medford Invitational, while Esme Anderson sprints toward the finsh line. MATT FREY/THE STAR NEWS