The rain that many welcomed this past week in Virginia to give temporary relief to the drought our state is experiencing was nothing compared to the drought that the Thomas Edison boys cross country team broke this past Wednesday at National District Meet which spanned decades. In winning the National District team title in dominant fashion with a team score of 19 points, the Edison boys won their first district title since 1979. Current University of Tennessee coach George Watts was the star of those great Edison teams back in the 1970's. The 2007 Edison squad was led by a junior twin pair of Leoule (pictured right by Ted Plunkett) and Tihut Degfae as the individual district champions and runners-up.
Thomas Edison coach Berni Flynn has put together her best team ever at Edison led by the talented Degfae twins. Leoule has had a breakthrough season of cross country running with some of the state's best runners and emerging as a serious contender for the Northern Region title next week at Burke Lake. His biggest competition was his brother Tihut as they ended up controlling the race up front with Leoule winning his first title in 15:55 and his brother Tihut trailing in four seconds later at 15:59 for second place.
To put up a team score of 19 points though, they needed three others to finish high up there also as they got those efforts out of Spencer Rodriguez (4th, 16:26), Jonathan Iredell (5th, 16:35), and Shaeban Hicks (7th, 17:02). Edison will likely be an underdog to make it out of the regional meet next Thursday, but certainly would be a great story considering they have not fielded a team experiencing as much success as this year's group in quite a while.
J.E.B. Stuart's Abiy Mohammed gave the Degfae's a run to make them worth to take the top two places as the senior finished off the Edison pair in third place at 16;01.
Edison nearly had another champion with Myah Hicks finishing as the individual runner-up in the girls' race, but it was Lindsey Hunt and the Yorktown girls day to be champions. Hunt finished third in the National District Meet last year as a freshmen with a time of 19:11, but only needed a 19:30 performance to win this year at Burke Lake as poor rainy conditions slowed the course down. Her teammates keyed off her first place finish with five more finishers earning All-District honors for coach Mark Stripe as Yorktown claimed the title with 45 points. J.E.B. Stuart girls finished with 68 points in second place.