(Guthrie Center) ACGC is the defending Class 1A Boys State Cross Country Champion. The Chargers are back in the state meet and hope to repeat as champs.
Coach Colin Shawgo told KSOM/KS95 Sports before the state qualifying meets that he’s expecting his team to be the favorite to win it all. “I’ve done a lot of research on this and I really think there are three teams going for that state championship. I think that we are the favorites going in and we’ll have a target on our back. Iowa City Regina has put in a lot of good performances this year and they are going to give us a run for our money. I think Woodbine is a really young team with some exceptional talent and I’m really excited to see what they can do. So I think it’s going to come down to the Chargers, Woodbine, Iowa City Regina at Fort Dodge. Hopefully the Chargers can end up prevailing. I think with our experience and how we have started to come on the past couple of weeks we have a very good shot at repeating.”
Junior Andrew Mahaffey placed 17th at state last season and was 4th in the state qualifying meet. They are highly motivated to prove they were worthy of the #1 ranking throughout the season. Mahaffey says, “A lot of this season we’ve been sold short through various things. We want to go in and prove to everybody that we are still here and we are still the best team in the state.”
Senior Justin Reinhart placed 3rd at a very strong state qualifier and is coming off of a 21st place finish in Fort Dodge last year. He is ranked #1 individually by the IATC. Reinhart remarks, “It was nice, but then again rankings don’t mean anything. I like to keep that in mind. It’s a nice honor, but you have to put that aside and run your race. It’s all our training. We try to be as consistent as possible, but with the way we train and the distance we put in that middle to end of the season is when we really start to kick it in.””
Sophomore Ava Campbell is an individual qualifiers for the ACGC girls. She placed 2nd at last week’s state qualifying meet in Guthrie Center. Campbell placed 27th in the state meet last year.
