Girls Preseason 2nd Team All-State

While her greatest potential is likely in the middle distance events, Littlefield is no stranger to success on the grass. In her two years of high school running, she has two top-10 finishes at the 5A State Cross Country Championships. As a freshman she never finished outside the top 10 in the cross country season and was eighth at the state meet.

In 2021, she took silver medals at her district and regional meets then finished seventh at the state meet as the Lovejoy girls won the 5A state title. In between her excellent cross country seasons was a track season where Littlefield claimed her first state title as she won the 800 in 2:08.

Fastforwarding into the spring of 2022, Littlefield put her exceptional range on full display. Racing every distance from 200 to 3200 meters, she ran personal bests in each event and got more successful experience at massive championship races under her belt. A collection of fantastic 400 meter races along with very strong performances in the 1600 constructed the groundwork for an 800 meter campaign which propelled her into the nation's elite tier of middle distance running. In the 400, she was district champion and ran as fast as 55.91.

That speed was coupled with the strength of a 4:55 1600 personal best. She also managed to win a regional title and qualify for state in the 1600. The climax of her season came in two parts. The first came in Austin as she won the 5A 800 meter state title in a staggering time of 2:06. One month later she ran 2:07 to claim sixth at New Balance Nationals. 

Littlefield's junior year will provide several opportunities to capture gold at the state level. In the fall, she will be fifth best returner at the state meet and a real contender for a spot in the top three as Lovejoy looks to defend their spot on top of the 5A mountain.

13.) Adelynn Rodriguez (El Paso Eastwood)

With only one full cross country season and one track season on her resume, the outlook on Love's potential for her senior year is relatively uncertain. Last fall, she got off to a winning start at the Southlake Carroll XC Invite as she edged out Shewaye Johnson in 17:23.

As the season wore on, the meets increased in quality and Love continued to perform. She was fifth at the Lovejoy XC Fall Festival and the Garmin Milesplit XC Invitational just one week apart, then eighth at the Mcneil Invitational in late September. Alongside her win at Southlake, her best performance of the season came at the Chile Pepper XC Festival where she was second to Oklahoma superstar, Cayden Dawson and just ahead of her sister, Alli Love. She was out of commission for the district and regional meets, though her teammates managed to advance to state without her. She returned to racing at the 5A state meet where her 21st place finish helped her team to a fourth place finish. 

Her last races on the track were in the spring of 2021. Her 800 meter campaign included district and area titles and finished with a fifth place finish at the 5A State Track Championship in a personal best of 2:12. She also secured a 1600 meter personal best of 5:00 at the North Texas 1600. 

Love is serious about soccer, but if she returns in the fall and replicates her form from one year prior, she will have a real chance to win a medal in the extremely difficult Conference 5A at the state meet in November.

Given the uniquely high standard that existed in UIL Class 6A last year, Koonts could not have hoped to achieve much more than she did last fall. Her sophomore cross country campaign was on course to be solid until it became excellent.

She was 20th at the 6A state meet as a freshman and most of her performances last fall were within the realm of expectation. Her eighth place finish at the Texas A&M Invitational followed by a fifth place finish at the District 4 6A Championships suggested her potential finish at the state meet would likely be similar to her freshman year. Her runner up finish at the Region 2 Championships was a significant step forward and preceded her breakthrough in November. In Round Rock, she overcame every girl who beat her at the district and regional meet as she was fifth overall behind a group of Region 1 superstars.

In the spring, she ran two personal bests at the Region 2 Championships. Her 10:58 performance landed her just outside of state qualification in the 3200, but managed to punch her ticket to state the following day by running 5:00 in the 1600 and securing a regional silver medal.

This fall, Koonts will be the third best returner from last year's 6A State Cross Country Championships. The key to her success in her sophomore year was peaking at the regional and state meets. Though she may fly under the radar early on, if Koonts can replicate her well timed peak and make marginal gains in fitness, she will be a real threat to upset the state's favorites in November.

While her track season was limited to just two meets, her junior cross country season was highly successful and preceded by two years of consistently elite performance at the top end of 5A.

In her first two years, she produced back to back fourth place finishes at the 5A State Cross Country Championship. In the spring of 2021, she added personal bests of 4:58 and 10:53 to her resume. While she found herself just outside of state qualification in the 3200 that season, she was the 1600 silver medalist in Region 4-5A and finished fifth in a thrilling 5A state championship race. 

This led her into yet another brilliant cross country season where she raced very often and very well. An eighth place finish at the Lovejoy XC Fall Festival and a fourth place finish at the TAMUCC Islander Splash got her competitive season going and led into one of the best performances of her career to this point.

At the Hoka One One Mcneil Elite Invitational, she battled Isabel Conde De Frankenberg to the wire at Old Settlers Park. Frankenberg edged Bailey by one second as they dropped third place by 25 seconds. At the 5A Region 4 Championships, Bailey got the better of Frankenberg with relative comfort. At the state meet, she was unable to hang on to the front group, but still managed to finish sixth. While it may not quite have been the triumphant climax that her season seemed to build up to, if a rough day for her is a sixth place finish at state, the potential for her senior year is through the roof.

Leading the way in Lovejoy's dominant state title winning run was Amy Morefield. Her fifth place finish was the peak of a fantastic fall in Morefield's junior year, though she managed to sustain it to a respectable extent past the UIL season. She rounded off the cross country season with an 85th place finish at the Garmin RunningLane Championships which is commendable in its own right.

The spring brought her equal success at the state meet along with personal bests in five events on the track. From March 12th to April 29th, Morefield won five 3200 races including wins at the district, area and regional meets. The best way to illustrate how well she performed in the 3200 last spring is to note that her fifth place finish at the state meet could reasonably be classed as an underperformance. Morefield also demonstrated that she has plenty of speed to go along with her exceptional strength. In March she broke 60 seconds in the 400 and ran a 5000 meter personal best of 17:45. 

Given that Morefield ran the fifth fastest time over 3200 meters in 5A last season and she was one spot away from qualifying for state in the 800, it is unknown what route she may take to the medal stand at next year's state track meet. However, her resume up to this point leaves no questions, reservations, or reasonable doubts that she has the ability to be on every podium the UIL has to offer this fall.

As the youngest member of Flower Mound's top seven last fall, Fox laid the foundations for a breakthrough spring. She was consistently among Flower Mound's top five and rounded out the scoring positions for the Jaguars with her 20th place finish at the 6A State Cross Country Championship. She concluded her fall by cracking into the nation's top 100 at the Garmin RunningLane Championships with an 87th place finish.

In March, Fox began her track season with a pair of dominant performances. Following a comfortable 3200 meter win at the Coppell Relays, she claimed gold by nine seconds in the Freshman Girls Mile championship at New Balance Nationals Indoor. Her commanding victory at New York's Armory propelled her into the remainder of her track season.

In seven attempts, she never failed to break 11:00 in the 3200 and her two fastest races came on the state's biggest stages. Her personal best of 10:30 came at the UIL 6A Region 1 Championship where the Flower Mound trio of Cook, Humphries and Fox cruised away from the competition in what was a preview of the 6A 3200 meter final in Austin. Securing the bronze, Fox completed a record book medal sweep for the Jaguars and established herself as one of the top individuals in Texas.