Even When It Looks Bad, It's Still Great For Purcellville

By Doug Binder, DyeStat Editor

PORTLAND -- Coach Joan Hunter wasn't optimistic that No. 1-ranked Purcellville (Loudoun Valley VA) had pulled off its mission of back-to-back championships Saturday. 

Sam Affolder was having trouble near the finish. Her son, Jacob, was having a so-so race, and the team's sixth and seventh were having off days. 

"I didn't think we'd won," she said. 

As it turns out, this team is so good that even when things seem like they aren't going well, it is well ahead of the competition. Not only did Purcellville win, it scored 77 points and won by 37 points over Temecula (Greak Oak CA). 

Loudoun Valley went wire to wire as the No. 1 team in the nation for the second year in a row and became the first boys team to repeat as the champion at Nike Cross Nationals. The 77 points is a record-low score for the boys team championship competition. 

But there was some vulnerability. 

Affolder, the team's leader, experienced rough going late in the race. 

"Everything was locking up and freezing cold," he said. "Something happened to my body. It was hard to keep pushing."

Before the final hill, Carlos Shultz caught Affolder and saw him struggling. He turned completely around and implored Affolder to come with him. 

"I was just thinking I wanted him with me," Shultz said. "I didn't want to leave him behind. He passed me going up the hill and then I came back and got him, but we're teammates."

Shultz and Affolder finished 30th and 31st, good for eighth and ninth in the team scoring. Not far behind was Hunter in 39th (12 points). Then came Kellen Hasle in 52nd (19 points) and Connor Wells in 63rd (29 points). 

"At a meet like this you just try to not blow up," said co-coach Marc Hunter. "There's so much stress on the kids. A couple of kids (Shultz and Hasle) really ran well."

Some of the coaches' concern came when the two-mile split was announced and Purcellville was listed third. But Wells had been missed in that tabulation and the team was, in fact, ahead by 30 points. 

Great Oak coach Doug Soles surmised that on a really good day his team could have scored 100 points -- but not 77. 

Littleton CO (Dakota Ridge) put a Colorado team on the podium for the second straight year. The Southwest Regional champions finished just one point behind Great Oak, with 115 points. 

Warwick (Bishop Hendricken RI) finished fourth with 206 points and Manlius (Fayetteville-Manlius), one of the pre-meet favorites, finished fifth with 209 points. 

California put three teams in the top eight, along with four in the top 11. Newbury Park, led by the impressive fourth-place finish of junior Nico Young, was sixth. And Stevenson Ranch (West Ranch) got eighth, with La Costa Canyon securing 11th.