Photo by Jay W. Bennett Breaking out early in the lead pack during Saturday’s running of the 23rd annual Elizabeth S. Broughton Memorial Invitational were, from left to right, winner Blake Rodgers of Belpre, Warren’s Spencer Rehl, Marietta’s Ezra Minard (fourth), Shenandoah’s Dierkis Vincent, Parkersburg’s Jack Mills (eighth), Eastern’s Brayden O’Brien (runner-up), Marietta’s Ben Bauserman (15th) and Magnolia’s Landen Davis (12th).

MARIETTA — Williamstown sophomore Alyssa Sauro crushed her own meet record and Belpre junior Blake Rodgers finally broke through with a victory here Saturday morning during the 23rd annual Elizabeth S. Broughton Memorial Invitational.

A two-time runner-up, Rodgers crossed in 16 minutes and 13 seconds to take top of the podium honors after finishing behind Parkersburg’s Franklin Angelos in 2021 and former Golden Eagle teammate Eli Fullerton two years ago.

“It was perfect. Probably 60, 65 (degrees), exactly where you want it to be,” said Rodgers, who along with teammates Carter Norman (9th, 17:29), Nick Diaz (10th, 17:33.1), Johnny Miller (17th, 18:32) and Austin Jenkins (29th, 19:13) posted a winning team score of 59 to finish ahead of Marietta (68), Parkersburg (76), Williamstown (89) and Warren (116). “It feels great. I’m always behind Eli or Franklin or somebody, but finally out on top.

“It feels good. I was just kind of running for myself, running for my own time and it worked out all right. It’s just an amazing team. I think this could be one of the best cross country teams we’ve ever had out of Belpre. I think we will 100% be making it to the state meet, without a doubt in my mind. It’s going to be a great year. It (today) was about time and winning. I really wanted to win, but then once I kind of broke away I was like I want to get a solid time here and start off the season strong.”

Sauro ran a 17:56 last season and clocked in with an effort of 17 minutes and 29 seconds to finish ahead of teammate Brianna Winsett (20:47) and Wood County Christian’s Lacey Dimit (20:56).

Photo by Jay W. Bennett Williamstown sophomore Alyssa Sauro, who repeated Saturday at the 23rd annual Elizabeth S. Broughton Memorial Invitational along with breaking her own meet record with a time of 17:29, races out ahead of a pack that includes Belpre’s Shy Miller (11th), Marietta’s Ava Gebczyk (sixth) and Williamstown’s Brianna Winsett (runner-up).

“I like it,” Sauro said of the course as the ‘Jackets repeated as team champs with a score of 21 to top Parkersburg (57), Warren (78), Marietta (97) and Waterford (105). “I think the hills are really challenging and that makes it a lot more exciting for me. I just like hilly courses.”

The WHS standout added “there’s a couple races when I’m running to back off so like I can peak at the right time. Today was kind of that day and I tried to go out a little bit slower, but I’m happy with my time and how everything went.

“Brianna, she’s doing amazing and the group is all working together. I’m really happy with how we are working together and how everyone is doing.”

Aside from Williamstown’s top duo, the ‘Jackets also had scoring efforts from Sydney Anderson (5th, 21:13), Lexi Wynn (7th, 21:23) and Sylvia Harris (15th, 22:35). Brookelyn Reynods of WHS finished 16th with a time of 22:46.

“Coming into this race I was coming off an IT injury,” admitted Winsett. “I wasn’t expecting too much of anything. I was just coming out to try and see what it would feel like and just coming back I was super glad to be around my team. Everything felt good and I’m glad that we are all back out here.”

Winsett added of trying to get over her offseason injury “I did a lot of cross training to try and stay in shape, but I didn’t want to dive back in too quick so I didn’t run last weekend (St. Marys Autumn Classic) because I didn’t want to hurt it again. Everything is feeling good. I was pretty nervous about it today, but I’m glad that it went well.”

The Wildcat Dimit finished 14th as a junior with a clocking of 22:11.

“I am so happy,” she said. “I PR’d from last year by a lot. My last race was really good. I’m really happy. I had no expectations really. I was like there was no pressure.”

Until the end of the race that is as Fort Frye’s Cadence Waller attempted to catch her down the stretch, but finished six seconds behind in fourth.

“I could tell she was near because I could hear people cheering for her, but I didn’t know how close she was,” Dimit added. “I just pushed as hard as I could. It’s my senior season and I’m very happy about it.”

Eastern senior Brayden O’Brien was 24 seconds behind Rodgers and three ticks faster than Marietta senior and third-place finisher Kasy Science (16:40), who narrowly edged Tiger 11th-grade teammate Ezra Minard (16:46) and Williamstown sophomore Julian Johnson (16:54).

“It’s a great season opener because it’s tough,” admitted O’Brien, who finished in the top five for the second time in his career. “Most courses you run after this are not going to be that hard. They went out a little harder than I wanted to, which kind of swayed how close I got to Blake.

“I wanted to kind of keep it a little bit steady and push it toward the end. I didn’t have enough to catch up to him, but as far as a goal I kind of did about what I wanted to, a 16:37, which is definitely a solid time on this course.”

Science noted “I ran a 19:26 last year and I got 22nd so this is a big jump for me. I was just hoping to get in the 17:30s. I didn’t think I was going to break 17. It was awesome. A good race.

“I thought I was going to get absolutely destroyed, but it was awesome. I got to thank Ezra a lot because I was training with him. He’s such a good runner and he got me in good shape.”

Joining Science and Minard in the team scoring for the Tigers were Ben Bauserman (15th, 18:26), Isaac Lough (26th, 19:03) and Maxwell McCabe (30th, 19:30).

Parkersburg’s girls were paced by Katie Rutherford (8th, 21:49), Aubrey Lantz (13th, 22:18) and Ellie Hines (14th, 22:27) in the top 20. Accounting for the final scoring for second-year head coach George Angelos were Alyssa Barker (22nd, 23:31) and Olivia McEwuen (30th, 24:37).

The Big Red boys had top 20 efforts from Jack Mills (8th, 17:17), Ricardo Salazar (14th, 18:14) and Daniel Martin (19th, 18:38.8), who finished just behind West Muskingum’s Jacob Agin (18th, 18:38.4) and barely ahead of Warren’s Aiden Westerman (20th, 18:39.1).

“I’ve been super proud of this team all summer, all preseason and very pleased today in the opener as well,” stated coach Angelos. “Nearly half of our team was running their first high school race ever and not a single senior running varsity (top seven) for either team.

“Yet still, our girls finished second overall as a team and had three award winners on the podium. Our boys despite missing two guys who have been running top three to five placed third overall and also had three award winners. It was a good start and we’ll use this as a baseline to move forward from.”

Also collecting top 20 efforts for the boys were Williamstown’s Zach Cannon (6th, 17:12) and Will Coiner (11th, 17:33.6), Eastern’s Connor Nolan (7th, 17:16), Magnolia’s Landen Davis (12th, 17:34), Caldwell’s Blake Miller (13th, 18:09) and Chuck Estadt (16th, 18:29) as well as Marietta’s Ben Bauserman (15th, 18:25).

Marietta’s Ava Gebczyk just missed out on a second career top five effort and had to settle for sixth place with a time of 21 minutes and 15 seconds.

Warren (Hollyn Reed, 10th, 22:06/Maggie Reynolds, 17th, 22:48) and Waterford (Averi Schwendeman, 19th, 22:52/Seneca Lang, 20th, 23:02) had a pair of thinclads apiece who cracked the top 20.

The remainder of the top 20 finishers featured Morgan’s Emily Pinkerton (9th, 21:55), Belpre’s Shy Miller (11th, 22:06), Paden City’s Lexi Mathis (12th, 22:16) and Eastern’s Erica Durst (18th, 22:50).

Contact Jay Bennett at jbennett@newsandsentinel.com