Central League Championships - Meet Preview
Girls' Race
Fresh off a dominating DELCO performance last week at Rose Tree, Grace Forbes and the Strath Haven girls return to Media, looking to claim a CAL title.
Forbes is the heavy favorite for Saturday, rolling to the DELCO title by well over a minute last week. Look for Forbes to easily win again at Rose Tree. The battle for second should be interesting. Penncrest's Sophie Cohen was a strong second place at DELCOs last week. Strath Haven's Abby Loiselle wasn't far behind taking third. Non-DELCO runners Sarah Hurst of Lower Merion, Michelle Qin of Harriton, and Anna Twomey of Conestoga should also get in the mix. Qin was second in the Central League last year.
Strath Haven is the team to beat. Entering at PA#10, Haven has all the pieces to roll to its third CAL title in four years. Last year's champs, Conestoga, should be strong, as well as Lower Merion.
Boys' Race
The Haverford boys showed off their strength and depth at DELCOs last week, putting five boys in the top nine to roll to the county title with 23 points last week. This week will be closer and more competitive, as Lower Merion heads to Rose Tree. Haverford just beat Lower Merion 26-31 in the dual meet on Wednesday. We'll see how these two Hershey hopefuls fair in a bigger meet. Penncrest, also in that dual meet will look to hang with these squads.
Mike Donnelly of Haverford was the DELCO champ last week and also captured the win in the dual meet on Wednesday. He'll be the one to beat again on Saturday at Rose Tree. He'll get a good challenge from Radnor's Ethan Zeh, who was very close to Donnelly at DELCOs. Haverford's Josh Fingerhut and Brendan Campbell (third and fourth at DELCOs) and Penncrest's Patrick Theveny (fifth at DELCOs) will also be in the mix. The Lower Merion duo of Joey Litvin and Charlie Herrmann have proven to be a solid top two this season, and those two should put down low scores, too.