Photo by Don Rich
A Girls | Holy Cross and Elk Lake now battling for one state spot
D2-A Girls Team Preseason Rankings
One of the big changes coming to District 2 Single-A this season is the elimination of one of the state spots allotted to teams (as well as some individual spots). The implications here are big, as D2-A has been dominated for the last few years by two teams--Holy Cross and Elk Lake.
In fact, in every year of Single-A's existence (since 2012), one of those two aforementioned teams has won the district title. And in the last three seasons, Holy Cross has won and Elk Lake took second in relatively close races. But ultimately, both teams qualified for the state meet, so getting second wasn't a huge deal. In 2013, those teams took 1-2 at the state meet! In 2014, they were second and third. Last year, they were fourth and sixth.
The stakes are very high this year, as only one of those teams will earn a team spot to Hershey. Like the seasons that came before, it will be a close race between the two top teams in D2-A.
Holy Cross have won the last three district titles and loses one of its varsity runners from last season, Mackenzie Greenfield. They do return individual district champ Lexi Walsh, though, who will be going for the repeat there. They put five in the top 11 of the district last season, but there was over a two minute drop back to their sixth runner. With the loss of Greenfield, they'll need someone to step up to be a strong five and lower that gap.
Elk Lake also losses just one from its varsity team of 2015. Their top girl from last year, Katie Bennett, has graduated, but a good group led by seniors Justine Johns and Keri Jones are back. They do will need to add some strength on the backend of the top five if they want that state spot.
Wyoming Seminary was third in 2015. They return four runners from last year's team and they'll try and be competitive with some of the top runners from the top two teams.
The Holy Cross-Elk Lake showdown is always a big one in District 2 A, but this year the rivalry has been pumped up several notches. Both of those teams have runners in line for some individual state spots, but both will be fighting hard to send their whole team to states.