Cranford girls Group II

Veteran Cranford Boys and Girls Cross Country coach Ray White, figures his girls team is where the boys were a year ago at this time and considering the boys won White his third state title Saturday, that should serve warning on the state for next year. The Cougar girls, entirely made up of underclassmen, just missed making it to the Meet of Champions finishing fourth in the Group II championships, one place out of qualifying.

“The girls were very relaxed this year just like the boys were last year ,” said White. “This year they got their feet wet
and now they know what it takes to reach the next level.”

Continuing her remarkable season, sophomore Laura Gallo once again led the Cougars with a third place finish in 19:46,.06, a thirteen second improvement on her section winning team of two weeks ago. Like everyone else, Gallo was well behind the winner Vanessa Wright of Haddonfield who ran 19:01.50.

“We didn’t want her to try and run with Wright ,” said White. “Laura ran her race and nearly finished second. It will be great for her to run in the Meet of Champions next week.”

By virtue of her top ten finish, Gallo will compete with the top runners in the state at tomorrow’s Meet of Champions. Her time ranked twenty-seventh overall.” Laura has had a very good season so far and as long as she continues to train the way she has been and with her gutsy style the future is very bright ,” said assistant coach and former Cougar star Tim Styler.

“Tim has been a huge help working with the girls this year ,” said White.
“It is so much easier to coach when you have someone like him helping you.”

Sophomore Jen Hanke, whose brother Josh ran on the champion boys team, was second girl as she has been all year, finishing nineteenth in 21:14.17 but the Cougars’ usual third runner, Nicole Cabrera struggled through an illness and was a non-scoring 79th in 23:16.51.

“Nicole shouldn’t have been running with the way she felt but she gutted it out ,” said White.
“With her normal performance we would have had a good chance for third.”

The scoring was completed by junior Kristen Ford, sophomore Allison Stolte and freshman Erin Hannen.
“The girls are young and a fourth place finish in that company is a great performance plus they are all young and coming back next fall ,” said Styler.