ONA — This time, Savannah Pritt looked toward the finish line and saw no one ahead of her.

The Cabell Midland High School senior cross country standout finished first in the girls race at the Mountain State Athletic Conference meet on Saturday on the Knights’ home course. She started quickly and never lost the lead.

As a freshman, Pritt finished second to Hurricane’s Audrey Hall, who now runs at West Virginia University. As a junior, she was runner-up to the Redskins’ Ella Hardin, now running at Marshall University. As a sophomore, Pritt suffered a pelvic fracture and didn’t run at all.

“It feels good to win,” Pritt said. “I wanted to win. That has been my goal. I hurt my back a couple of weeks ago and I started to feel it pretty bad going up the first hill and I thought, ‘I don’t know if I can do this.’ It’s all a mental battle.”

Pritt ran 18:49.32 to outlast Parkersburg’s Morgan Mertz, who finished in 18:55.46 in the 107-runner field. Lindsey Bailey of Cabell Midland was third in 19:40.01, followed in the top five by Hurricane runners Francy Tidd at 19:41.72 and Sofie Zappitelli at 19:49.38.

Pritt gave an assist to her friend Megan at Dunkin’ Donuts for the triumph.

“I went there (Saturday) morning, and I love her to death,” Pritt said. “I was telling her it was the MSAC this morning and she told me, ‘You run on Dunkin’, so you’ll win.’ I did. I’m going to go back and tell her I won.”

The Knights won the girls and boys team titles. The girls totaled 27 points. Hurricane was second with 62 ahead of Parkersburg with 90, Parkersburg South with 103, St. Albans 126, Woodrow Wilson 187, Spring Valley 197, George Washington 224 and Huntington High 230.

Cabell Midland took the boys title behind Dylan Dial’s runner-up finish. The Knights tallied 37 points to edge Parkersburg’s 43. Hurricane was third with 90, followed by Woodrow Wilson with 114, George Washington 147, Parkersburg South 173, Huntington High 180, St. Albans 189 and Spring Valley 244.

Kyle Peters of Woodrow Wilson won in 16:19.51 for his fourth victory this season. Dial ran 16:24.23. Connor George of Parkersburg at 16:30.63, Paxton Haddox of Hurricane at 16:58.65 and Griffin Brunty of Cabell Midland in 17:19.31 rounded out the top five in a race with 131 competitors.

“I was hoping to win, but I wasn’t sure, being it was Cabell Midland’s home course,” said Peters, a junior. “I knew they’d challenge me a lot. (Dial) gave me a run for my money. I finally got a surge on him. All I wanted was to hold it.”

Peters took the lead about the 3,000-meter mark.

“I got a straight stretch and felt good on him,” Peters said. “That’s where I pulled out. It was a great race.”

Peters said the victory gives him confidence heading into the region meet in two weeks.

“I’ll try to draw on that experience,” Peters said.

Cabell Midland coach Chris Parsons said he was pleased the Knights won both championships on a course where the state meet will take place in three weeks.

“Our girls came out and ran really strong,” Parsons said. “They ran better than they did at the XC Festival (Aug. 30). They’ve gotten better. All of our top seven, top eight, ran really good times, but the goal from now to the state meet is, you want to run faster.

“On the boys side, we battled with Parkersburg. They have a good team. We ended up winning by six points. It was a close race. They came to race. We’ll see all these Quad-A teams again in two weeks on a flat course at Huntington.”