Hutchinson CC Sports Information
NORTH NEWTON – For the second-straight cross country race this season, Hutchinson Community College sophomore Teagan Flanagan was the individual runner-up.
That performance, combined with four Blue Dragon runners finishing in the Top 25, helped the NJCAA No. 3-ranked Blue Dragon men finish as team runner-up behind Region VI rival Allen at the Bethel College Cross Country Course.
But the men's race was anything but normal on Saturday.
The race was inadvertently shortened from the standard 8,000 meters to a 4-mile race, which caused some confusion with the runners. The bizarre occurrences didn't stop there.
Flanagan and Fort Scott's Gudisa Adnow pulled away from the pace to make it a two-runner duel for the individual championship. With about a half-time to go, Flanagan had roughly a 10-yard lead, but he tripped in a gopher hole and went down. Adnow passed him and Flanagan wasn't able to make up the lost ground and finished second.
The Blue Dragons had 76 team points to Allen's 56. Butler was third with 90 points.
Hutchinson did make a big improvement from the Terry Masterson Twilight, which was also 4 miles. The Blue Dragons cut four total minutes off their total time from September 4 to Saturday and all six Hutch runners trimmed time from their Masterson Twilight times.
Flanagan posted a time of 19 minutes, 57.44 seconds to lead the Blue Dragons. Fort Scott's Adnow's time was 19:52.33.
Sophomore Andrew Holt had his best performance as a Blue Dragon with an 11th-place finish. Holt's time of 21:13.45.
Freshman Cameron Delaney had a second-straight strong meet, finishing 19th with a time of 21:29.43.
Sophomore Jacob Mcelhanon was 24th with a time of 21:43.68.
Sophomore Matthew Schrag placed 27th in 21:46.69. Freshman Aaron Geissinger placed 53rd in a time of 23:35.01.
The Blue Dragons will run again in two weeks at the Allen Community College Invitational on October 3 in Iola.