L-S boys end long drought, advance to state meet

PLEASANTVILLE — Lynnville-Sully head cross country coach Darin Arkema was on the Hawks’ most recent boys state qualifying team back in 1995.

His wife and assistant coach Anna Arkema was part of back-to-back team championships in 1995 and 1996.

And nearly three decades later, their oldest son Evan helped this year’s L-S boys’ squad return to Fort Dodge as the Class 1A No. 15 Hawks placed second in the state qualifying meet at Pleasantville Golf Course on Thursday.

The Hawk boys will join the girls’ squad at the state meet for only the third time in school history as they also placed second in the team standings.

“What tremendous accomplishments by these athletes,” L-S head coach Darin Arkema said. “The crowd of L-S supporters was truly impressive. We are so blessed to have a great group of young people to work with and blessed to have strong healthy bodies with the ability to run.”

There were three teams in the boys’ 10-team field with a legitimate chance to be one of the top two finishing squads at the Pleasantville state qualifier.

Coach Arkema knew fifth-ranked Earlham would be tough to beat, but the Hawks had already finished ahead of Pekin in another meet earlier this season.

The Cardinals did indeed win the team championship with 41 points, but L-S placed three in the top 10 and six in the top 30 to score 12 fewer points than the Panthers. The Hawks defeated Pekin by 13 at their home meet in September.

For the L-S boys, they just wanted to be in front of or pass anyone in a red jersey.

“This feels amazing. I was pretty shocked to find out how long it’s been,” L-S senior Ethan Dunsbergen said. “It feels pretty special to be a part of it.

“I just wanted to pass anyone in a red jersey. We knew those two teams would be in the top three with us.”

The top two teams and top 10 individuals in 1A qualify for the state meet, but most of the top 10 featured runners from L-S, Earlham and Pekin so two extra individual spots were handed out.

Senior Hendrick Lowry and sophomores Colton Alberts and Blake Wilmesmeier all would have qualified for the state meet individually had the team not qualified.

The fifth-ranked Cardinals placed four in the top 10 and the 5-6-7 runners were in the first 17 as well.

Pekin may have been deeper than the L-S boys overall as the Panthers only had one in the top 10 but five were in the first 25.

The Hawks’ dominance at the front put them over the top and Dunsbergen and Keegan Schnell won races to the finish line against fellow Pekin runners, too.

“I wanted to stay close to Ethan and maybe pass him and then be prepared to pass anyone in a red jersey,” Schnell said. “I heard fans yelling for a Pekin runner behind me so I wanted to make sure I stayed ahead of him, too.”

Coach Arkema thought Dunsbergen was in a spot on the course that would end up being very crucial in the end result.

“Pekin was able to get four runners across the finish line in front of (Dunsbergen) and their fifth runner was part of the group he was in, plus four or five others,” Coach Arkema said. “If he didn’t step up to get to the front of that group it could have been an 8- or 10-point swing. But he was gritty and tough and showed great finishing speed to get in front of all but one and the Pekin runner was at the end of the pack crossing the line so that helped secure our team position.”

Alberts is back to the state meet after qualifying as a freshman. He was third in the boys’ 5K race with a personal-best time of 16 minutes, 54.39 seconds.

He’s the first Hawk male ever to qualify for the state meet in his first two prep seasons.

Unlike some others in the race, Alberts doesn’t like to get out too fast.

“I ease into the race and let the first mile go off pace and then I start chasing people,” Alberts said. “I know a lot of people will try to go out fast but maybe won’t be able to hold it.”

Lowry also qualified for the state meet for a second time. He was fifth in his most recent race with a career-best time of 17:10.74.

Wilmesmeier came in 11 seconds later in ninth. His career-best time was clocked in 17:21.9.

Lowry said his experience from last year helped him with knowing how fast the first mile would likely be.

“You have to stay relaxed and not get caught up in it,” Lowry said. “I thought I was doing that but got to the first mile in 5:18, which is way ahead of my pace. I just told myself to hold on.”

Dunsbergen (18:37.87) and Schnell (18:55.39) were the final two scoring runners for the Hawks in 21st and 26th, respectively, while Madden Gunsaulus (18:55.72) was a non-scoring runner but came in .32 seconds behind Schnell in 27th.

The final non-scoring runner was Evan Arkema, who placed 37th in 19:36.

“We put in a lot of effort to get to where we’re at,” Evan Arkema said. “I was focusing on anybody who could place in front of us as a team.”

Class 1A No. 15 Jude Dykstra of WACO won the boys’ race in 16:40.8. Winfield-Mount Union’s Kolby Newsom was the runner-up in 16:49.89.

The other ranked runner in the field was No. 24 David Nichols of Earlham, but he was the Cardinals’ third finisher in eighth.

The 10th place finisher came across in 17:34.23 and the 12th and final qualifying runner finished in 17:42.21.

“Right from the start it was evident Earlham would be a tough squad to match,” Coach Arkema said. “Our top three guys were right up with or ahead of their top runners early, but the difference was how close their next two to three runners were.

“The other team that was certainly making it interesting was Pekin. Their top two runners are tough, but tonight they were getting some great efforts from their next four runners. I thought the way they were racing we were going to be in trouble. But all of our guys showed real grit and determination, battled as hard as they could for their respective individual placings, all for the sake of trying to get us as low of a team score as possible.”

Earlham, L-S and Pekin all scored fewer than 100 points in the first three positions. WACO (127) and Hillcrest Academy (147) placed fourth and fifth, respectively.

The rest of the 10-team field included Winfield-Mount Union (158), North Mahaska (201), Pleasantville (203), Wayne (224) and Southeast Warren (225).

The incomplete teams were Sigourney, Lamoni, Moulton-Udell, Highland, Moravia, Melcher-Dallas, Keota and Mount Ayr.

Lowry recognizes that football and basketball may always be the more popular sports at the school but hopes the recent success of the cross country teams help put those programs on the map, too.

“It was the first time we were ever SICL champs, too,” Lowry said. “I’ve had a lot of people come up to me at school telling us good job. Cross country is not really a popular sport like football. Our school has been great at football and basketball. But now maybe we can keep this cross country success going and the community has been great in supporting us.”

The Hawks rely so much on their top three runners and that trio all posted career-best times to finish in the top 10.

But Wilmesmeier and Lowry both think their ability to run up front helps the rest of the squad, too.

“I think the top three being up there helps push everyone else,” Wilmesmeier said. “I think it’s been a determining factor in every meet this year. It was my goal all year (to qualify individually) after seeing Hendrick and Colton there last year. I’m just glad I got it done.”

The top 16 ranked teams advanced to state. The No. 15 Hawks will start the 1A boys’ state race in Box 8. They’ll be next to 13th-ranked ACGC and 11th-ranked Tri-Center.

The top five teams in 1A are No. 1 Lake Mills, No. 2 Ogden, No. 3 Woodbine, No. 4 Danville and No. 5 Earlham.

Fifth-ranked Earlham will be in Box 16 and 14th-ranked Baxter starts in Box 19. Lynnville-Sully placed 13th in both 1994 and 1995.

“We are excited and looking forward to the week to come and the opportunity to compete at state,” Coach Arkema said. “The athletes talked of the possibility to be team state qualifiers at the end of last season. They committed to the summer running and work necessary to improve. They helped bring in new team members. They believed in themselves and each other and set goals that hadn’t happened recently. They trusted us as coaches to have a plan to help bring success.”

Lowry placed 69th at last year’s state meet and Alberts was 109th.

“I’m feeling good about this team,” Alberts said. “I think we can really compete and start to leave a really big mark for this program.”

For Schnell, he’s just happy to be running again after a life-threatening health scare sidelined him for his entire freshman season last fall.

“It’s been awhile. It feels good. I’m very proud of our team,” Schnell said. “It’s been a journey up to this point. It’s surreal and weird to be in this position after all that happened last year.

“I always thought I could come back from it, but I knew it would be a lot tougher. And it is a lot tougher.”

The Class 1A boys’ state race is scheduled to begin at 11:15 a.m. on Saturday. The top 15 individual finishers earn state medals. Lynnville-Sully, Earlham, Danville and Sioux Central all sent both their boys and girls teams to the state meet.