October 13, 2017 at 12:13 p.m.
Laggis: Hodags hope to be 'faster' and 'competitive' at GNCs
Laggis: Hodags hope to be 'faster' and 'competitive' at GNCs
"As always the goals are to keep getting faster and to be as competitive as we can be," coach M.J. Laggis said following last week's Hatchet Invite in Tomahawk.
The Hodags don't have the firepower to keep up with conference powers Lakeland and Medford, but Laggis hopes, if things fall Rhinelander's way, his team can be right in the middle of the pack in both the boys' and girls divisions.
Rhinelander is also looking to be in the mix for a few spots on the all-conference team, which are awarded to the top 14 finishers in each of Saturday's races.
A few other things to follow for the meet, which will begin at 11 a.m. at the Northland Pines High School athletic complex:
Alayna's chase
Rhinelander senior Alayna Franson is the defending Great Northern Conference girls' champion, but she's still searching for her first win of the year and does not enter Saturday's meet as the favorite to win the girls' title.
That honor belongs to Lakeland sophomore Ashley Peterson, who finished 10th at the GNCs last year, but has turned in a strong season. Peterson and Franson have raced head-to-head three times this season, and Peterson has easily gotten the better of Franson in all three meetings - including a nearly 42-second margin of victory last Saturday in Tomahawk.
Neither Franson nor Laggis have conceded victory in the conference race just yet, but both said Franson needs to run a smart race Saturday to get by Peterson.
"I think it's really the pacing and setting myself up for a good race," Franson said. "I can't go into it thinking that she's going to beat me by 20 seconds. I've got to pace myself right at the start. I've got to be OK with her having a couple of yards on me."
If Franson can stalk Peterson over the opening two miles, Laggis said he hopes all the work Franson has put into her finishing kick will pay off.
"Trying to get her to speed up in the last third of the race is what it would take to beat Ashley," he said. "Ashley's very gifted and so is Alayna. We'll work hard and, mentally, she'll have to be ready to rock at Northland Pines and, hopefully, she'll have the finish she needs."
Peterson and Franson appear to be the top contenders for the girls' crown. Darkhorse candidates include Lakeland's Aubrey Anderson, Medford's Franny Seidel and Northland Pines' Annalise Callaghan.
Bridger's back
Bridger Flory, who has missed the entire season so far recovering from a offseason lower leg injury, appears to be ready to make his return on Saturday.
Flory was Rhinelander's No. 1 runner in almost every race last season. He competed in a high school mountain bike race last Sunday and ran with the team this week at practice.
"I think he is still, with his level of fitness and conditioning, he can still come in and be (one of) our top two or three guys, no problem," Laggis said. "It's just a matter of being healthy, having confidence and finishing."
Regardless of how Flory performs Saturday, his return will add depth to a RHS boys' side that has been depleted by illness over the last few weeks.
"It's going to give us an emotional lift when that little guy's back in the lineup. We need him," Laggis said.
Been there, raced that
Saturday will mark the second time in 12 days that the Hodags have raced the Northland Pines course, which is contested on a combination of the flat Northland Pines athletic fields and the more hilly terrain of the adjacent Eagle River Golf Course.
The Hodag boys ran the entire course back on Oct. 3. The Hodag girls' got through about two miles before their race was called due to lightning. Laggis said his team will look to use that previous experience to its advantage on Saturday.
"There's a couple of tight areas back there in difficult spots with where leaves are going to be and tree roots popping up and some slippery areas," Laggis said. "It was really good that they saw the course and they know what to expect at conference."
Mocking the meet
Gauging how Saturday's races will unfold is an inexact science, given that no two schools' schedules are exactly alike. Only once have all seven GNC schools raced the same course on the same day this season. That was the Bill Smiley Invitational Sept. 16 in Wausau. Extrapolating the results from that meet for all seven schools indicates Lakeland is the favorite to win both the boys' and girls' conference titles. They would have edged Medford by 13 points on the boys' side and six points on the girls' side in a mock GNC race.
Those numbers fit with what Laggis has seen first-hand during the regular season.
"When you look at Lakeland, where they're at and how they're built, they're very, very good," he said. "Most people haven't seen a lot of Medford this year and Medford thinks they have a girls' side that could go to the state tournament quite easily. They've got a lot of good runners, too."
Goals
According to the mock, the Hodags are right in the middle of the pack in the girls' division, nine points behind Tomahawk for third and seven points ahead of Mosinee for fifth. The boys are projected to finish sixth, but Flory's return may help the team close the gap to fifth-place Mosinee.
"I hope we come out and I hope we're in the thick of it. Not that we're, by any means, the favorite to be at the top, but I hope we're in the thick of it right behind there," Laggis said.
Individually, Hodag senior Anna Sturzl, who finished seventh at last year's GNCs, was 11th in the mock conference race at Smiley and will look to earn a spot on the all-conference team for a third straight year. Daniel Ritchie and Markus Johnson were just outside the projected all-conference cutline at 16th and 17th, respectively, in the mock GNC boys' race.
Jeremy Mayo may be reached at [email protected].
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