"Straight nasty!" is the only way you can describe Oakton's team performance on Saturday at the Lake Forest Invitational held at the Killens Pond State Park in Delaware. Virginian Davis Barry of Patrick Henry won the Varsity A division in 16:15, but it was a swarm of Oakton jerseys soon following the 4:20 miler with a 13 second pack for their top five consisting of Joe LoRusso (2nd, 16:17), Brian Hendricks (4th, 16:19), Neal Hendricks (5th, 16:19), Chris Weil (6th, 16:28), and Andrew McCullen (7th 16:29). The Cougars had extra security in the sixth man spot with 11th place finisher Scott Maxfield (16:43). Killens Pond State Park is by no means a fast course as the incredible fact is that Oakton had six runners faster than the 2004 Thomas Jefferson squad's top finisher (Chris Katilie, 1st, 16:44) at Lake Forest, which went onto win the AAA state title. There is no question which team has established themselves as the class of the field in the Southeast region boys as Oakton recently received the #1 regional ranking after a dominant win against three other ranked teams at Great Meadow on September 8th.
The Oakton girls seem to be responding very well to Coach Phil Tiller, who had exclusively coached the boys' team prior to this season as the Oakton girls beat some of the better Delaware squads (outside of 2006 NTN squad Tatnall who was absent from the meet) by talling a very low team score of 24 points. The Lady Cougars were just as well packed as their male counterparts if not better through seven with a 24 second spread existing between their first finisher as well as race runner-up Becca Kassabian (19:54) and seventh finisher Jenna Cahill (12th, 20:18)
Lake Forest Invite - Varsity A Boys Results