The Shore Coaches Invitational (October 5th) is the first major meet of the season. Teams are drawn from the entire state and the competition is fierce as every team seeks to make a powerful impression. Cherokee ran in the Division A race against 28 other teams, including state powerhouses Old Bridge and Hunterdon Central. Keith Krieger won the race in 16:15.4 (14 seconds faster than his time last year), and the team took 3rd place overall. In the Freshman race, Greg Bredeck took 2nd place, closely followed by Rich Nelson (9th) and Will Andes (27th). (Click on each picture for a larger version.)
Cherokee ended its dual meet season with an easy victory over C.H. East on October 9th. Krieger trained through the meet, and Yersak, McLaughlin, Freeman, and Candy swept the first four places in the race at Gloucester County College. (A number of athletes did not run because they were scheduled to run the Burlington County Frosh-Soph Meet the next day.) The final score was 18 - 41, and that gave the Chiefs a 5 - 0 season and the American Division title for the sixth year in a row.
In the Burlington County Frosh-Soph meet (October 8th), Coach Shaklee rested several runners who competed on the previous day in the C.H. East dual meet. Bredeck, Nelson and Andes led the Freshman contingent in this meet, while McFadden, Dolan, and Steve Brown led the Sophomore group. Bredeck and Nelson took 1st and 2nd in their race (Andes was 7th); while McFadden, Dolan, and Jeff Brown took 2nd, 8th and 9th respectively in the Sophomore race.
In the SJ Frosh-Soph Meet at Delsea on October 21st, Greg Bredeck took 2nd place, Nelson took 8th, and Andes took 19th to lead the Frosh contingent. In the Sophomore race, McLaughlin, Candy and Yersak took 1 through 3, closely followed by Dellamonica in 5th and Maneval in 7th.
On October 12th, Coach Shaklee broke the team into two and competed in the Manhattan Invitational at New York City's Van Cortlandt Park, and in the SJ Cross Country Open at Delsea High School in South Jersey. In NY, the Varsity ran in a steady rain and took 3rd in the Varsity A race. Keith Krieger fell at the start but still finished an impressive 4th in the race in 12:51.3, the fastest NJ time in the meet. At Delsea in the JV competition, three Cherokee teams were entered. The first team took 2nd place overall, with Freshman Greg Bredeck taking 2nd in the race. He was followed closely by Rob Henry, Brian O'Rourke, Steve Price, Rich Nelson, Paul McFadden and Kevin Cuneo. The second team took 5th overall, while the third team took 12th overall. Here are some pictures from the SJ Open at Delsea.
