Above: Ethan Bokowski (Desert Vista), Lisandro Mccarter (Prescott), Seth Chacon (Walden Grove)
Tenacious Twos - Boys' Fastest Second Runners in 2020
Today we look at our fastest returning boy runners in the two-spot for their respective teams in the state of Arizona.
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 1-7 runners in 2020. So your expected number second runner in 2020 may have been your number 3, 4, or 5 runner in 2019, depending on how many athletes you graduated.
Today we are focusing on the boys' second-man returning runners. We had 214 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-16:15 for their teams in 2019.
Ethan Bukowski (Desert Vista): Another strong sophomore runner for the Thunder in 2019. Ethan was usually the team's fourth runner in most races and ran pretty consistently in the high-15s to low 16s for the majority of his races. His best overall finish was 10th at the Tempe City Championship Meet. His best 5K time came was at Nike Twilight (15:54), but also had a very strong performance at State with a 16:18 and being the Thunder's 4th runner that day. Even though Desert Vista loses two seniors Coach Hanson always has the Ahwatukee boys ready for a championship run year-in-and-year-out, and with juniors runners like Bukowski 2020 should be another strong showing for his team.
Lisandro Mccarter (Prescott): Another strong sophomore in this list of top 2nd runners. Lisandro was the Badgers' number two runner in 2019, and had a number of top-10 finishes in 2019. He was 7th at Peaks XC Invite, being the first underclassmen to cross the line in the boys' varsity race. His top placement last fall was third at the Bradshaw Mountain Invite with a time of 17:18. He also took 7th at Sectionals breaking 17-minutes (16:56). And at Division III State Lisandro was 11th overall with a strong time of 16:41, just a hair's breath away from Prescotts' number one runner, senior Alec Almendarez. Like many on these lists, Lisandro's fastest race of the season was at Nike Twilight (16:02). Prescott loses two seniors from last year's team, but with Lisandro now being a junior he may be able to move his way up to the top-five at state individually and help his team try to at the very least defend its runner-up crown from 2019.
Seth Chacon (Walden Grove): Chacon had a break out year in 2019. He averaged a 19:38 in his 2018 cross country races and blew that away in 2019 with an average time of 17:31 (over a 12% improvement). Seth had top-ten finishes at Sectionals (7th) and Nike Twilight (8th in the boys' small school race). He ran his PR of 16:07 at Nike Cross Nationals Southwest Regional race and placed 36th overall at State. He was Walden Grove's number two runner in 2019 and as the Red Wolves lose none of their top-five, the team and Chacon may prove to have an awesome 2020 season.
Lance Harris (Flagstaff): As a freshman in 2018, Lance ran for Page High School and put in over ten races under his belt with times ranging from 16:05 to 18:28. He was 18th at State with a time of 17:15 and was Page's fifth man to help them win the D3 State title. In 2019, Lance became a member of the Flagstaff squad and was primarily the Eagles' fourth runner. He ran a 16:09 at Nike Twilight and broke 17-minutes in all races but two in 2019. He placed 14th at State for Flagstaff, being their fourth-man and helping the Eagles capture the D2 State title. Flagstaff loses a couple of top runners, but Lance, who will be a junior this year should still make the boys up north a tough competitor in D2 once again.
Two other runners who broke 16:15 were Brady Eager from Mesa Mountain View (16:13) and John Shinski (16:13) from Liberty High School.