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Eels win Washington Invitational; Hickenbotham crowned individual champion
Clay City’s boys high school cross country team couldn’t have asked for a better week.
The Eels won their annual invitational by placing eight of their runners in the top 16 and proceeded to carry that momentum into Saturday’s Washington Invitational, besting Shakamak – the meet’s runner up – by 13 points to win two titles in a four-day span.
Earlier in the week at the Clay City Invitational, senior Jayden Hickenbotham finished in third place, a spot head coach Cole Schroer envisioned the team’s pole setter would use as motivation the rest of the season. Whether Hickenbotham ran with that in the back of his mind on Saturday is unknown, but his thoughts were centered around, he managed to run faster than everyone else in the 63-man field to become the Washington Invitational’s individual champion with a time of 17:56.
Joining Hickenbotham in the race’s top 13 included Luke Swearingen (3rd with a time of 18:05), Luke Laswell (10th with a time of 19:02), Brady Hauer (11th with a time of 19:07), Brayden Wiram (12th with a time of 19:09) and Mason Lucas (13th with a time of 19:39) while Reed Sawyer (18th with a time of 20:30) and Alex Edwards (20th with a time of 20:46) each finished in the top 20.
Clay City’s girls cross country team was without sophomore standout Ashley Martinez-Morales who was held out of action for precautionary reasons after rolling her ankle during the team’s home invitational on Tuesday.
Still, the Lady Eels finished third in the team standings and were only eight points behind Sullivan for second place.
Freshmen Anna Duckwall and Shelby Hofmann led the way again for Clay City. Duckwall finished fifth with a time of 23:22 and Hofmann finished ninth with a time of 24:22, marking their best placements in any race this fall.
Lydia Grant (15th with a time of 25:01) cracked the race’s top 15 while Sydney Lowdermilk (21st with a time of 26:41), Millie Withers (26th with a time of 26:56), Tessa Stagg (27th with a time of 27:01) and Olivia Shidler (29th with a time of 27:45) finished in the meet’s top 30.