By Michael Newman

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It came down to two runners that did not even race in the IHSA State Meet in 2017. Choosing one runner was even tougher in this category.

Cort Ross of Casey-Westfield made his step to the next level this fall. He did not make it to state in 2017 finishing 16^th at the Carlinville Sectional. He made that trip to Detweiller Park this season by finishing fourth at the St. Teresa Sectional. The junior followed that up by running 15:13 to finish ninth in the 1A State Meet. He did not win any invitational races in 2018. That should change in 2019.

Cree Stumpf of Roxana followed a similar path as Ross finished 18^th at the Carlinville Sectional failing to qualify for the state meet. He was dominating towards the end of the season winning his regional and sectional races before finishing 17^th at the state meet.

It was a close decision between these two quality runners. The edge went to Stumpf. Both runners had similar levels of improvement. Ross improved his 3-mile time by 52 seconds. Stumpf’s improvement was 41 seconds. Ross had the edge on placing at the state meet (9^th place compared to 17^th place).

What caught my eye was their races during the season. Ross was consistently in the top 10 in his 2017 races achieving that in five of his eight races. Stumpf was not near the front in his junior year races (2017). He went from 60^th at FTTF in 2017 to 11^th in his same race in 2018. He was 18^th in this year’s Peoria Invitational compared to 91^st in 2017. Winning four races in a row against good competition towards the end of last season convinced me. It was extremely close, but the edge went to the senior Stumpf.

Congratulations to Cree Stumpf of Roxana High School as the 2018 ILXCTF.com 1A Boys XC Most Improved Runner of the Year.

Photo Credit – © 2018 Laura Duffy