Cardinal Gibbons Back To Defend Its MileStat XC Title

The Raleigh Cardinal Gibbons (NC) and Mount Tabor (NC) girls squads are two of the better teams in the Southeast Region and they will headline this year's elite girls team field at the MileStat XC Invitational. 

Cardinal Gibbons threw down an impressive perfect score of 15 points in their last trip to Virginia at the Knights Cross Invitational and are coming off a runner-up finish to Tatnall School (DE) at the Great American Festival last weekend.

The Gibbons girls have two sub-18 minute performers in Hannah Rae Shaffer and Addy Mitchell, as well as nearly their entire top seven under 19 minutes. Their seventh runner, Catherine Lorelle, owns a 19:07 best.

The Mount Tabor girls, meanwhile, were fifth-place finishers at Great American last weekend and also have a pair of sub-18 minute individuals up front.  Bronwyn Parks and Joiner Evans are their two leaders, while the team's top five is under 19 minutes. Mount Tabor boasts an 18:22 5K team average.

The Cardinal Gibbons girls could challenge a sub-18 minute average. They are the defending meet champions, winning last year's meet with team score of 114 points and a team average of 18:45. 

Another out-of-state squad to watch out for is the Cambridge Christian girls, who won a state title in 2021 and were the state runner-up  in 2022 for the Florida Class 1A classification. They are making the trip all the up to RVA to race this weekend for the first time.

The Cambridge Christian girls currently have an 18:56 team average which includes a sub-18 minute performer in Hannah Kasper, as well as a sub-11 minute two minute athlete in Ava Hendrix for their No. 2 runner. 

North Oldham out of Kentucky, First Flight out of North Carolina and St. John's College out of DC are all projected to finish well inside the top 10 at the MileStat.com XC Invitational, but Virginia's best programs are looking to not let the out of state programs totally dominate the top places and grab all of the trophies for the top five team finishers.

St. John's College finished third in last year's MileStat.com XC Invitational. 

South Lakes (VA) and Jamestown (VA) both raced well at Great American in their Race of Champions last weekend; South Lakes took 10th and Jamestown was 13th.

The Blacksburg girls were champions at the Oatlands Invitational last month and historically have always faired well and won several past MileStat.com XC Invitational titles.

Loudoun Valley was fourth at Oatlands Invitational and earlier in the season was the runner-up team at Knights Crossing behind Cardinal Gibbons.

Spotswood is a team to be on the look out for on Saturday, too, especially after winning at Panorama Farms two weeks ago in the VTCA Fall Classic.  

The Glen Allen girls were the runner-up squad last weekend at Oatlands and will look to be the top local finishing team, but other programs such as Hanover and host school Atlee might also have say in that matter.