Girls’ cross country dominates the MSL Conference
October 18, 2022
The girls’ cross country team took home the MSL Conference champions title for the third year in a row on Saturday, Oct. 15 at Deer Grove East. The Prospect girls’ swept the competition, winning all 3 levels by a landslide. Frosh/soph finished with 16 points, just one short of a perfect score. JV finished with 23 points, 35 less than the second place team. Finally, varsity finished with 25 points, winning by 49 points.
Varsity placed all seven of their runners within the top ten places. The Knights were led by sophomore Veronica Znajda, who placed third with a time of 17:14. Rounding out the rest of the varsity lineup was Hailey Erickson (4th; 17:20.26), Lily Ginsberg (5th; 17:28.93), Meg Peterson (6th; 17:35.33), Cameron Kalaway (7th; 17:55.9), Samantha Patterson (9th; 18:15.98) and Ireland Wildhart (10th; 18:29.49).
Other than team championships Prospect had also had two individual champions. Sophie Fransen, sophomore, won the frosh/soph race, and Kaitlin Skelton, junior, won the JV race. Both of these runners finished with times that would have been top 25 in the varsity race as well.
Kaitlin Skelton led the JV race by over a minute, with two Prospect girls finishing 2nd and 3rd behind her.
“I saw everyone else do well before me so I know I wanted to do well too. It was kinda lonely [running by myself] but all my teammates were cheering for me so that was nice,” Skelton said.
Although this wasn’t surprising, considering Prospect has been ranked number one in the state this season. They had an amazing accomplishment of having 25 all-conference runners. There are 75 possible spots for all-conference meaning Prospect took 33 percent of the awards available, more than any other team.
Coach Pete Wintermute is always proud of what these girls continue to accomplish.
“Great Day for the Knights at MSL Conference. [It’s the] #1 team day of the year,” Wintermute said on Twitter.
The girls are ready to conquer the rest of championship season with regionals on Saturday, Oct. 22 and sectionals and state the weeks following.