“It’s been a great rivalry with the Staples/Motley Cardinals for several years and it has been a toss-up as to who will win when the boys go head to head,” said WCA Head Coach John Van Kempen.  “The Section 6A meet was held in Long Prairie with races going on all day due to COVID restrictions and only allowing four teams to race at a time.  Once the gun fires, its “mano e’ mano”, which translates to man to man.  They were going to have the number one spot with Emmit Anderson, the number one state ranked runner and we were planning to fill in the next three spots with Kyle Schill, Kade Runge and Alex Salwasser.  We were going to break up their next five with Shad Swanson and Reubens Swanson.  We had everyone in the correct place and were counting on other teams to hopefully fill in some positions to push their runners back and that didn’t happen.  The Cardinals finished with 38 and Knights had 40.  Both teams are victims of our own success.  Both teams have been ranked #1 and #2 in the state all season and when you throw 26 teams into a race, you’d expect runners from other teams to fill in more spots.  Of the top 19 finishers of 166 racers, the Cardinals and Knights had 12 of them, that wasn’t going to be enough for us to beat them." 

Van Kempen continued, “At the end of the day the kids were thankful for just getting the opportunity to have our season and to race Cardinals one last time, as we beat them by two earlier in the season.  Kade finished in 2nd, Kyle in 3rd, Alex in 8th, Shad in 11th and Reubens in 16th.  In a normal year, we would advance to the state meet where we would get another shot at beating them, but not this year due to COVID.  Sophomores Peyton Hanson was our sixth across the finish line in 32nd place and Roman Mihailovschi in 40th.  

In the last six season, the boys have four section titles and two second place finishes.  Senior Kyle Schill has been a part of all of them.  His running resume with the team is absolutely unbelievable.  At state, the teams Kyle raced with have finished 4th, 5th, 8th, 2nd and 2nd and we believe this year we could have been on the podium again.  It also includes a conference championship, overtaking the Perham Yellowjackets for the first time in 18 seasons.  With all that on his running resume, his personal resume is even more impressive.  He’s a straight A student and treats every single person in the school with respect.   During this difficult season with COVID and things constantly changing, there hasn’t been a more positive leader on the team than him.  Prior to the race, he hugged and thanked his coaches and that point for me, nothing else mattered.”  

Staples-Motley won the team title with 38 points, two in front of West Central Area (40).  New London-Spicer was a distant third with 132.  They were followed by Litchfield (209), Holdingford (226), Ashby-Brandon-Evansville (236), Ottertail Central (256), Parkers Prairie (266), Minnewaska Area (318), Bertha-Hewitt (336), Osakis (340) and Breckenridge/Wahpeton (341).  Sauk Centre (346) was thirteenth, then Melrose (350), Benson/KMS (356), Royalton (361), Eden Valley-Watkins/Kimball (374), Albany (405), Border West (441), St. John’s Prep (470), Morris Area/Chokio-Alberta (521), Pierz (635), Long Prairie-Grey Eagle (664) and Pillager (757).

Here are the individual results by team:
Staples-Motley
1. Emmet Anderson 15:51.1, 5. Issiah Tabatt 16:59.4, 9. Lyle Brownell 17:32.0, 10, Logan Robben 17:33.3, 13. Luke Brownell 18:00.3, 18. Tanner Robben 18:15.7, 19. Grant Johnson 18:22.4

West Central Area
2. Kade Runge 16:55.4, 3. Kyle Schill 16:56.7, 8. Alex Salwasser 17:07.8, 11. Shad Swanson 17:44.9, 16. Reubens Swanson 18:11.6, 32. Peyton Hanson 18:52.1, 40. Roman Mihailovschi 19:08.4

Ashby-Brandon-Evansville
24. Hunter Norby 18:33.2, 42. Wesley Siira 19:14.0, 49. Micah Fossell 19:20.4, 52. Jaydon Hoidahl 19:27.9, Matson Hoff 19:55.3, 80. Logan Froemming 20:08.2, 98. Jacob Cook 20:30.7

Ottertail Central
29. Isaac Scherfenberg 18:44.6, 39. Blake Alonzo 19:05.5, 60. Kale Misegades 19:38.7, 63. Peter Newark 19:45.0, 65. Nick Carter 19:51.2, 86. Isaac Hallberg 20:16.5, 97. Noah Mansker 20:30.3

Breckenridge-Wahpeton
14. Aidan Ruddy 18:04.5, 45. Francisco Perez 19:16.3, 61. Luke Baumgardner 19:42.9, 105. Logan Mamenga 20:41.0, 118. Deven Demert 21:05.0, 131. Bryce Awender 21:29.7, 134. Gus Lasch 21:37.3

Parkers Prairie
6. Johnathan Suchy 17:03.5, 12. James Suchy 17:54.7, 72. Cole Steele 19:56.7, 83. Jason Koehn 20:09.1, 95. Justin Koehn 20:29.7, 150. Isaac Grabow 22:32.7

Bertha-Hewitt
22. Brady Rach 18:28.5, 56. Chris Blashack 19:30.3, 77. Preston Miller 20:03.9, 91. Aden Rach 20:21.2, 93. Zach Baumgartner 20:23.8, 94.IsaacBlashack 20:27.8, 152. Ryan Knoll 22:40.2

Border West
23. Joe Arens 18:32.1, 51. Derek Lupkes 19:24.1, 110. Cole Sykora 20:45.4, 128. Conner Goodhart 21:28.8, 132. Eli Larson 21:36.7, 137. Andrew Stueve 21:46.0, 142. Jens Jorgenson 22:02.9

Pillager
135. Jacob Hooge 21:39.2, 151. Gunnar Casuse 22:39.1, 158. Gabe Grimsley 23:43.4, 160. Micah Moyer 24:08.5, 162. Brenden Brichacek 25:10.1, 166. Jayde Jordahl 26:18.6

Hillcrest
69. Noah Brumfield 19:54.6, 149. Rye Frobish 22:23.8, 164. Simon Carlson 26:06.8

The girls run their 6A meet on Thursday at the Little Crow Golf Course on Thursday.