2024 Rankings: Division 2, County Week

We’re out of Portage, out of the bigger area meets (Oakland and Wayne County), now onto more of championship season. Many of the top teams competed in a meaningful meet and we’re better able to discern their intentions for this final month of the season.

The WEEK 3 RANKINGS contained the best explanation of the year, so click there. But I’ll add another sentence of emphasis: although this past weekend’s meets weigh the largest, they are not the end all be all, these are cumulative.

Here are the other rankings:

WEEK FOUR
CHAMPIONSHIP SEASON

Recap

Probably wasn’t as dominant as Spartan, though Allendale was clearly the class of the D2 field at Portage. A different competitor stepped to the forefront for the Falcons – Kilian Whalen. The senior has had much adversity thrown at him throughout his career. Through it all, he’s survived and just dropped a 12 sec. PR. The depth on this team is still impeccable. Their 6^th runner came in before everyone’s 4^th and almost everyone’s 3^rd. You could take Whalen out of the lineup and Allendale still would’ve won.

Beyond the Red n’ Black, Forest Hills Eastern moved up a spot. The Hawks are greatly benefitting from the addition of junior Shephard Bower, learning the sport on the fly. Three straight sub-17’s in just four races at the high school level.

In the Region 15 preview at Cummings Center, Frankenmuth leaned on its depth and pack running. Five Eagles under 17 helped ‘Muth hold off Flint Powers.

Just a reminder, these rankings don’t move teams down for one bad race. Unless it becomes a trend.

Looking Forward

The West Side/OK Conference + Portage sort of dictates the schedule here. Conference championships in the middle of next week, a huge festival of races this past Saturday. Mix in some smart, judicious coaches and that equals taking this weekend off.

We have had a bit of mid-week action, Otsego winning over Plainwell in the M-89 rivalry. Alma defeated Frankenmuth in the final TVC Red Jamboree, enough to win the conference title. Alma has curiously been ranked below Frankenmuth all season in the coaches poll, despite winning in the TVC each time out (side note: if I were a coach, I’d rank my team as low as possible, just for the motivational factor). The Panthers will again find the opportunity to prove themselves at Greater Lansing, where the they look to defend last year’s crown.

Top 27

Rank	Team	Score	Region	Top 5 Avg.	Last Week
1	Allendale	175	11	196.2	1
2	Grand Rapids Christian	260	12	192.8	2
3	Holland Christian	328	11	189.8	3
4	Alma	341	14	191.1	4
5	Forest Hills Eastern	371	12	189.9	6
6	East Grand Rapids	406	12	188.1	5
7	Otsego	445	13	184.1	7
8	Frankenmuth	446	15	184.2	8
9	Plainwell	470	12	183.6	9
10	Flint Powers Catholic	528	15	185.6	10
11	Cedar Springs	561	10	181.4	12
12	Sparta	563	10	181.8	11
13	Marshall	573	13	186.8	13
14	Shepherd	614	15	182.3	14
15	Gladwin	658	10	181.9	15
16	Pinckney	695	16	178.7	18
17	DeWitt	740	14	175.8	16
18	Three Rivers	778	13	176.9	17
19	New Boston Huron	784	18	176.6	20
20	Freeland	786	15	180.2	19
21	Fremont	807	10	174.2	23
22	Grand Rapids Catholic Central	844	11	177.1	21
23	Corunna	863	14	172.6	22
24	Zeeland East	904	11	171.8	24
25	Spring Lake	927	10	171.0	28
26	Petoskey	951	10	170.1	29
27	Edwardsburg	961	13	170.1	25

Recap

Projections had Goodrich being first overall at Greater Flint, which was correct. However, I was a little high on the Martian point total. Mainly thanks to Claire Brown, who after a fall of running in the 20’s, has broken into the 19’s these past two weeks.

Zeeland East was able to rebound after their surprise defeat at Otsego. The Chix scored 3 girls in the top-10, the 3^rd being a Meredith Cook who broke into the 18’s yet again.

Looking Forward

Home meets and area championships. The rule of thumb is that if you host a meet, you have to defend your ground. Both Freeland and Goodrich are hosting, and thankfully, both appear to be favorites. Adrian will use their strength up front and hope to power to a Lenawee County win. Greater Lansing will be the stage for a D1/D2 crossover, as a top-10 Okemos will face DeWitt. The Panthers just ran the best times of their season at Birch Run and have shown (Spartan) the ability to be patient in pressure-packed situations.

Top 27

Rank	Team	Score	Region	Top 5 Avg.	Last Week
1	Zeeland East	160	11	137.9	1
2	Goodrich	198	15	131.0	2
3	Holland Christian	245	11	127.7	4
4	Otsego	273	13	130.5	5
5	Grand Rapids Christian	274	12	127.9	3
6	DeWitt	327	14	123.7	6
7	East Grand Rapids	360	12	121.8	7
8	Adrian	434	18	123.5	8
9	Freeland	478	15	118.5	9
10	Hudsonville Unity Christian	479	11	116.2	10
11	Linden	533	16	113.3	12
12	Spring Lake	550	10	111.9	13
13	Forest Hills Eastern	572	12	109.9	11
14	St. Joseph	652	13	114.2	14
15	Grand Rapids South Christian	714	12	104.9	15
16	Ann Arbor Gabriel Richard	746	18	105.7	17
17	Ludington	747	10	108.0	16
18	Frankenmuth	764	15	107.9	20
19	Cadillac	793	10	105.7	19
20	Sturgis	795	13	107.6	18
21	Shepherd	845	15	100.8	25
22	Coopersville	869	11	100.9	22
23	Pontiac Notre Dame Prep	903	16	99.4	21
24	Plainwell	936	12	96.8	24
25	Dearborn Divine Child	946	16	96.3	23
26	Owosso	948	14	96.4	26
27	Middleville Thornapple-Kellogg	1011	12	96.5	27

Individual Rankings

Recap

Down in Terredise, TJ Hansen hung with the Midwest’s best, running a 14:43 and placing 2^nd. I wish there were 48 hours in a day so that I could create some out-of-state speed ratings, so you’ll just have to understand that it was very fast.

In the state itself, we saw significant moves up the ranks from Simon Triezenberg, Will Engbers, and Edison Lopeman. The latter two dropped PR’s at Portage, Triezenberg narrowly missed. Each finished in the top four.

Looking Forward

Once again, sort of a weekend off. The teams that are near Lake Michigan are recovering from Portage and awaiting conference showdowns. TJ Hansen will be home with his Freeland squad, Jack Bidwell is in the D2 race at Gabriel Richard (with this weather and that course, expect something special if he goes for it). The Alma boys will be looking for every possible advantage up front. Surely they’ll be chasing the wise Jack MacGregor, though expect Thomas Larson and Zeke Baltierra to give him everything he can handle.

Top 50

Rank	Grade	Name	Team	Rating
1	12	TJ Hansen	Freeland	223.6
2	12	Jack Bidwell	Marshall	215.3
3	12	Colin Murray	Dearborn Divine Child	211.8
4	12	Henry Dixon	Forest Hills Eastern	210.6
5	12	Simon Triezenberg	Grand Rapids Christian	206.4
6	12	Will Engbers	Holland Christian	206.4
7	11	Jonah Workman	East Grand Rapids	205.7
8	10	Ezekiel Baltierra	Alma	205.7
9	11	Thomas Larson	Alma	205.6
10	11	Bryce Gross	Flint Powers Catholic	205.5
11	12	Jeb Hillary	Grand Rapids Catholic Central	205.3
12	11	Edison Lopeman	Parma Western	205.3
13	12	Dominic Lowrie	Battle Creek Harper Creek	204.5
14	9	Lennox Naswell	Flint Powers Catholic	203.8
15	12	Elijah Christensen	Gladwin	203.8
16	12	Sullivan Zietlow	Three Rivers	203.7
17	10	Bryce Cahoon	Shepherd	202.4
18	12	Kilian Whalen	Allendale	202.2
19	11	Moises Salazar	Adrian	201.4
20	11	Vincent Pattison	Goodrich	201.1
21	10	Abraham McHugh	Marshall	200.8
22	11	Ronnie Silveira	Allendale	200.2
23	12	Ben Gross	Allendale	199.9
24	12	Lucas Kuhn	New Boston Huron	199.7
25	12	Nolan Longuski	Shepherd	199.0
26	10	Cole McCraw	Pinckney	198.7
27	12	Jack Lillywhite	Flint Kearsley	198.2
28	12	Abatu Dykstra	Hamilton	197.9
29	12	Seth Mead	Gladwin	197.9
30	11	Owen Metzger	Sparta	197.7
31	12	Alex Doneth	Mason	197.6
32	12	Reece Davis	Marshall	197.0
33	12	Vincent Pollock	Fruitport	196.8
34	10	Mitchell Dunlap	Grand Rapids Catholic Central	196.7
35	12	Jacob Draaisma	Middleville Thornapple-Kellogg	196.5
36	10	Steven Zawacki	Forest Hills Eastern	195.9
37	12	Simon Erfourth	Owosso	195.6
38	12	Stewart Waters	Whitehall	195.5
39	12	Andrew Commeret	Comstock Park	195.3
40	12	Dylan Lydic	Haslett	194.3
41	12	Keegan Hoekstra	Grand Rapids Christian	194.1
42	10	Caiden Caswell	Vicksburg	194.0
43	11	Sean Ryan	Grand Rapids Christian	193.6
44	11	Jack Edison	East Grand Rapids	193.1
45	11	Luke Dulecki	New Boston Huron	192.7
46	11	Donovan Ryan	Plainwell	192.5
47	11	Ethan Shoffner	Cedar Springs	192.2
48	9	Micah Becker	East Grand Rapids	191.7
49	12	Will Whitmore	Holland Christian	191.3
50	12	Zachary Newman	Pinckney	190.9

Recap

With Emma Hoffman and Ava Schafer taking the weekend off, we were counting on Portage to deliver. We received a nice little competition between Emma Drnek, Katie Berkshire, and Courtney Bovair. Drnek and Berkshire were with each other at one, Bovair slightly behind. By two miles, it was just those two. Come the finish, Drnek, the recent MSU commit, had opened a nearly 10 second gap.

As projected, Natalie Foltz came through at Greater Flint. Mea D’Agostino has been going through the ringer of courses lately. Bennett Park, a hot day at Spartan, two championships at Possum Hollow. She didn’t place as well at Oakland County (14^th, still All-County), but recovered nicely to place 2^nd in the Catholic League.

Looking Forward

A few intriguing bits of action. Berkley Holtz going for her 3^rd straight hometown title at the 60^th Sturgis Kiwanis Invite. Jaelyn Ray coming off two mid-18 efforts, facing a rising Samantha Schroeder at Gabriel Richard. Then there’s a big one – Ava Schafer at Greater Lansing. Ava won there last year, now she faces a little stiffer competition, with two other competitors also finding their way into the 17’s this fall.

Top 50

Rank	Grade	Name	Team	Rating
1	11	Emma Hoffman	Otsego	168.2
2	10	Ava Schafer	St. Johns	164.2
3	11	Katie Berkshire	Gaylord	159.1
4	12	Emma Drnek	Zeeland East	158.7
5	12	Elena Figueroa	St. Joseph	156.1
6	12	Courtney Bovair	Carleton Airport	154.5
7	10	Clara Kaczor	Freeland	153.6
8	11	Berkley Holtz	Sturgis	148.9
9	10	Jaelyn Ray	Pinckney	147.5
10	11	Natalie Foltz	Frankenmuth	147.1
11	12	Sophy Skeels	Adrian	145.7
12	11	Ellie Scholma	Grand Rapids Christian	145.7
13	9	Adalyn Raab	Zeeland East	145.7
14	12	Ayla Holben	DeWitt	144.0
15	11	Marie Gates	Hudsonville Unity Christian	143.1
16	10	Adeline Armstrong	East Grand Rapids	143.1
17	10	Ayda Skeels	Adrian	143.1
18	12	Grace Evanoff	Flint Powers Catholic	142.1
19	12	Mea D’Agostino	Orchard Lake St. Mary’s	141.0
20	10	Johanna Mulder	Holland	140.9
21	10	Mia May	Sparta	140.4
22	11	Meredith Cook	Zeeland East	139.9
23	9	Avery Engbers	Holland Christian	139.4
24	10	Alivia Ottinger	Goodrich	139.1
25	10	Annabelle Lowman	Ludington	137.7
26	9	Remie Ellis	Eaton Rapids	137.4
27	11	Lilah Poel	Grand Rapids Christian	136.9
28	10	Lane Isom	Richland Gull Lake	134.8
29	11	Brooklynn Brown	Cadillac	134.4
30	12	Kamryn Lauinger	Goodrich	134.1
31	12	Joy Evans	Alma	133.8
32	12	Ava Crews	Middleville Thornapple-Kellogg	133.5
33	12	Nadia Grierson	Ludington	132.3
34	12	Eva Thompson	Croswell-Lexington	131.7
35	9	Audrey Kline	St. Joseph	131.3
36	10	Addison Josephson	Linden	131.2
37	9	Madison Petty	Adrian	131.1
38	9	Kayla Shellenbarger	Goodrich	130.8
39	10	Ellery Lampen	Holland Christian	129.7
40	12	Sadey Seyferth	East Grand Rapids	129.4
41	12	Layla Jordan	Goodrich	129.4
42	11	Alexis Kotkowicz	Spring Lake	128.8
43	12	Taylor Mitchell	Otsego	128.6
44	10	Kylie Mausolf	Birch Run	128.6
45	12	Mia Williams	DeWitt	128.5
46	9	Oakley Osterhart	Coopersville	127.6
47	9	Danica Redes	Shepherd	127.5
48	11	Linnea Paige	Fremont	127.2
49	12	Karie Keefer	Freeland	126.8
50	10	Olivia Hollebeek	Holland Christian	126.4