TAPPS 6A Results
Yesterday was the TAPPS Cross Country Championships, the time of year all of the teams in the league has been waiting for. We saw new individual and team champions being crowned and even some old ones.
The Houston St. Agnes girls won their second straight team title. Last year, they were hunting the previous champion Dallas Ursuline Academy who had a long championship streak of their own they were trying to protect.
This year, St. Agnes spent the season on defense from being hunted themselves. Sophomore Camille Napier helped lead the charge with her individual runner-up performance. She had immediate reinforcement as teammates Amelie Born and Emily Heinz followed right behind her in third and fourth place.
That wasn't the end of the type of day they were determined to have. To secure this year's title, their fourth (7th) and fifth runners (10th) finished in the top 10 to total only 26 points all within a 25 second split.
Dallas Ursuline Academy finished runner up as a team. They were led by the overall winner Amanda Hogan whose winning time of 12:10 was good enough to allow her to cruise in 12 seconds ahead of the rest of the field.
Ursuline dropped both their number two Katherine Reynolds (8th)and number three runner Devon Vopni (9th) in the top 10 helping to total 70 team points.
Houston Incarnate Word finished third overall in the girls team race. They were unable to place a runner the top 10, but their team style running was able to take advantage of the spread out race. Their 1:07 split was able to keep their point total low enough to score only 117 points, 27 better than fourth place.
The boys individual title came down to a sprint between Dallas Bishop Dunne senior Jonathan Cantu and Ben Tijerina and Hunter Haynes both of San Antonio Antonian. Cantu was in search of the title this season after finishing third last year. Yesterday, he won the boys race in 16:49.40.
The Antonian duo was only four seconds behind Cantu in 16:53.40 and 16:53.80. They helped lead Antonian to their third TAPPS 6A Boys state title. Juniors David Gomez (7th place) and Nicholas Flores (9th place) gave their team the back up they needed as they also ran to top 10 finishes. Antonian only accumulated 39 overall points and a 51 second split.
The real race in the team standing was for second place between Houston St. Thomas and The Village Houston. St. Thomas won that race by a slim 1 point margin 90 < 91.