Above: Grace Ping (Desert Vista), Taylor Lovell (Perry), Allie Thurgood (Flagstaff)
Scintillating Second Runners - Girls
Today we look at teams' fastest 2nd girl runners returning in the state of Arizona for 2020.
Some caveats on how we come up with these rankings; obviously, incoming freshmen can throw a wrench into these rankings, but we don't have high school times for these teens yet, so they are left out. Two, these rankings are based on these athletes' best cross country 5K times in 2019. We understand that different courses lend themselves to faster times than other courses, but this is just to give us a rough estimate of how the team's runners 1-7 rank against other teams' 1-7. The key here is we are talking about returning runners and not who was your second runner in 2019. After we account for seniors graduating, we are making an educated guess who will be your number one thru seven runners in 2020. So your expected number two runner in 2020 may have been your number three four, or five runner in 2019, depending on how many athletes you graduated.
Today we are focusing on the girls' second-person returning runners. We had 201 teams who have at least two runners who were juniors or younger last year. Teams without at least two runners who were juniors or younger last year did not make this list.
We are going to focus on the returning second runners who ran a PR of sub-19 or faster for their teams in 2019.
Grace Ping (Desert Vista): If Grace was on any other team in the state she would be her team's number one runner; but, sister Lauren is also on Desert Vista, which makes this sensational family duo a speedy one-two placing in many races they compete in. Grace had a 17:08 PR at the Footlocker West Regional meet in 2019. She was second at State (17:57), second at Sectionals, second at Desert Solstice, and first at Tempe City Championships. Having a longer spring and summer to get ready for the cross country season, Grace may be looking at another fantastic year on the course in 2020. The Thunder will be ready to roll in Grace's senior season.
Taylor Lovell (Perry): Taylor ran all but one of her 5K races last year in the 18-minute range. She ran her PR of 18:27 at the Chandler City Meet, where she placed third. At Nike Twilight she crossed the line in 18:53. And at State she had an incredible performance by placing 3rd overall and running 18:35. Taylor and Teammate, Kylie Miller, were one-two, two-one throughout the season. They both come back in 2020 and could be a big reason why Perry may try to break up the Desert Vista-Highland party at State this season.
Allie Thurgood (Flagstaff): As a junior, Allie was Flagstaff's third runner to the one-two combo of the Hall sisters. But, Hana graduated in 2019 and so Mia (last year a freshman) will most likely be the team's number-one. Flagstaff will have a young team in 2020 with Thurgood being most likely the only senior in the top-five runners for the Eagles. Allie had a season's best of 18:52 at Nike Twilight and placed 6th overall at State for the Eagles. Allie is a long-sprinter/middle-distance specialist in track (2:17.67 800m) and 2019 was her first foray into cross country. If Ms. Thurgood has put in any serious distance work over these past few months she may be looking at not only at a number two (or one) spot on Flagstaff's squad but possibly vying for an individual state title with the sort of leg speed she has in her back pocket.
Kylie Wild (Salpointe Catholic): As a freshman for the Lancers, Kylie was quite the addition to an already proud cross country tradition down in southern Arizona. Kyle was 5th overall at State (19:23) and had a PR of 18:54 at Nike Twilight. She had top 10 finishes in nearly all her races in 2019. She was sixth at Nike Cross Country Nationals Southwest Regional (Girls Medium School race), third at Sectionals, tenth at Eye of the Tiger Invitational, second at Rio Rico Rattler Invitational, fourth at the Glendale Showcase, and fifth at Ojo Rojo Invitational. Salpointe has a strong team returning in 2020 with Kylie most likely being the team's number one or number two throughout the season.
Taylor Mccue (Catalina Foothills) also broke 19-minutes in 2019 with an 18:57 best time, which she ran at Nike Twilight. Taylor was also 3rd place overall at Sectionals and placed 7th overall at State in Girls' Division II.