Texas Girls XC Team Rankings: Post-UIL State Championship

Flower Mound won the 6A girls title on Friday at Old Settlers Park with 68 points, 57 ahead of The Woodlands. Behind them, the race for second through fourth was much closer. The Woodlands, Southlake Carroll, and defending champion Bridgeland finished eight points apart. On Saturday, New Braunfels won the 5A title by 21 points over Highland Park. Lovejoy, last year's 5A champions, finished third.

The individual races had their own surprises. Katy Tompkins freshman Bailey Pipes won the 6A race in 17:20.5, 14.2 seconds ahead of Bridgeland's Hope Smith. In 5A, Lubbock High sophomore Amelia Anderson won in 17:47.1. The final rankings below include teams from both classifications.

No. 1

Flower Mound

No. 1 Flower Mound (Flower Mound, TX) Prev. No. 1 - No change

State Result: 6A State Champion

Flower Mound won easily with three runners in the top 10. Liana Cluley-Garza (Sr.) finished third in 17:38.3. Adeline Bennett (Sr.), who won Region I, was sixth in 17:47.7. Eliana Rivera (Sr.) was 10th in 18:08.2. Flower Mound's first three scorers totaled 12 points, and no other team was close at any point in the race.

Allie Driscoll (Jr.) and Jewel Barnes (Jr.) finished 45th and 49th, and the spread was 1:14.7. Even if their fourth and fifth runners had each finished 20 places further back, Flower Mound still would have won.

A year after losing the title last year to Bridgeland by three points, Flower Mound won it convincingly this time. They were No. 1 in our preseason rankings and finished the season there. They had a few bumps in the road in September, but this team found their form midway through October and never looked back, allowing them to capture their state title back. Cluley-Garza, Bennett, and Rivera are seniors, but Driscoll and Barnes return for 2027.

No. 2

The Woodlands

No. 2 The Woodlands (The Woodlands, TX) Prev. No. 3 - Up 1

State Result: 2nd in 6A

The Woodlands took second by two points over Carroll, and their pack is why. Naomi Weller (Sr.) led them in 12th in 18:17.2. Marta Linde Gomez (So.) was 35th, freshman Emma Harder 42nd, Leah Griffin (Sr.) 54th, and Emily Kacher (Jr.) 67th. The spread was 47.8 seconds.

The gap between Weller and the second runner was 26.6 seconds, wider than the 11.7 at region. It still worked out because the four runners behind Weller finished within 21.2 seconds of each other. When Carroll and Bridgeland had runners fall back, The Woodlands didn't. This was largely what helped this squad stand out throughout the season, and that consistency led them to what we believe is the best possible finish they could've achieved this season.

The Woodlands finished fourth at state last year in a disappointing race. This season saw them win Nike South, districts, and regionals while capping it off with a silver medal finish in Round Rock. Weller will be gone next season, but Emma Harder, Emily Kacher, and Marta Linde Gomez will keep this team near the front in 2027.

No. 3

New Braunfels High School

No. 3 New Braunfels High School (New Braunfels, TX) New

State Result: 5A State Champion

New Braunfels won the 5A title with three runners in the top 15, and two of them are freshmen. Savanah Moya (Sr.) was second in 17:56.0, 8.9 seconds behind Lubbock's Amelia Anderson. Halle Bryant was fourth in 18:11.5, and Tessa Shamblin was 15th in 18:36.9. Their first three scorers totaled 14 points, and nobody else in 5A was close.

Raeleigh Hudnall (Sr.) and Sydney Wantuck (Jr.) finished 42nd and 45th, for a spread of 1:22.9. Their 21-point win over Highland Park came from Moya and Bryant finishing ahead of Highland Park's top two, Adelaide Wortman and Ryan Sontag.

New Braunfels finished ninth in 5A last year and missed our rankings for weeks in the middle of this season. They finished as state champions, and Bryant and Shamblin are freshmen. 

No. 4

Southlake Carroll High School

No. 4 Southlake Carroll High School (Southlake, TX) Prev. No. 6 - Up 2

State Result: 3rd in 6A

Abigail Perez (Sr.) was 14th, Megan Bergman (Sr.) 26th, and Quinn Salstrand (Sr.), Nora Farden (So.), and Landry Lambert (Sr.) finished 53rd, 58th, and 60th. Carroll's spread was 41.0 seconds, the tightest of any team in the 6A top eight. Their fifth runner scored 37 points, better than any 6A team except Flower Mound. That's what kept them close to The Woodlands. They finished two points out of second and six points ahead of Bridgeland.

Carroll finished fifth at state last year and third this year. This group was one of the best-balanced teams in the state. Overall, this was an up-and-down year for Carroll, but they found their best form when it mattered over the back half of the season, which delivered them a string of impressive results.

No. 5

Dallas Highland Park

No. 5 Dallas Highland Park (Highland Park, TX) Prev. No. 2 - Down 3

State Result: 2nd in 5A

Highland Park's top two again finished side by side, but further back than usual. Adelaide Wortman (So.) and Ryan Sontag (Sr.) were ninth and 11th, 1.6 seconds apart. At region, they were second and third. Both New Braunfels runners at the front and Lovejoy's Emily Armstrong finished ahead of them.

The back of the lineup did better than it had all season. Finley Heckler (Jr.), freshman Orsella Hooks, and Paisley Bassett (Jr.) finished 39th, 41st, and 47th, all within 5.2 seconds. Highland Park's 54.2-second spread was their tightest of the year.

They still have a potential NXN qualification on the horizon, and Wortman is only a sophomore, meaning this squad will have another shot at the title.

No. 6

Bridgeland

No. 6 Bridgeland (Cypress, TX) Prev. No. 7 - Up 1

State Result: 4th in 6A

Hope Smith (Sr.) ran 17:34.7 and finished second individually behind freshman Bailey Pipes in an impressive performance for the Bears. Realistically, retaining the state title wasn't going to be our expectation for Bridgeland, as they lost two top-ten finishers from last year's team along with key depth. 

Brynlee Weston (Sr.) was 27th, 58.5 seconds behind Smith. Freshman Zoe Jaswani was 39th, and freshman Lorna Paul 64th, and Kate Garrison (Sr.) closed the scoring in 88th.

Bridgeland finished six points behind Carroll and eight behind The Woodlands. The defending champions ended the season fourth after losing four of last year's five scorers, and Smith finished her high school career second in the 6A race.

No. 7 Keller (Keller, TX) Prev. No. 5 - Down 2

State Result: 5th in 6A

A freshman led Keller at state. Emma Gibson finished 21st in 18:28.7, ahead of Sarah Darnell (Jr.) in 31st and Julia Graves (Jr.) in 43rd. Gibson ran 18:57 at Boyd in September and kept getting faster all season. This was her best finish.

Katherine Wander (So.) was 51st, and Quinn Boneau (Sr.) closed the scoring in 95th. The spread was 1:03.8. Gibson through Wander finished within 26.5 seconds, but Boneau finished 37.3 seconds behind Wander, and that's where Keller fell out of the podium race.

Keller were eighth at state last year and fifth this year, and they beat Carroll twice this season. If they had the perfect day, a podium finish wouldn't have been an outlandish prediction, but that wasn't the expectation heading into the race on Friday. Gibson, Darnell, Graves, and Wander all return, meaning Keller's 2027 squad will likely be one of the favorites.

No. 8

Comal Canyon

No. 8 Comal Canyon (New Braunfels, TX) New

State Result: 6th in 6A

Comal Canyon were the surprise of the 6A race. They had not appeared in our rankings all season, and they finished sixth, ahead of Northwest Nelson, Katy Tompkins, and Vandegrift. Madi Molinar (Sr.) finished 11th in 18:16.2, one second ahead of The Woodlands' Naomi Weller. Sophomore Caroline Tutt was 40th.

Paola Vargas-Llanos (So.), Allison Schoch (Sr.), and Scarlett Dusek (Sr.) finished 69th, 79th, and 80th, for a spread of 58.1 seconds. That isn't a team that wins a state title. But it held together well enough to beat several teams that had better results in September and October.

Molinar finished 34th as an individual at state last year and 11th this year. Comal Canyon didn't qualify as a team last year, so this was a big step up for the program and one that once again proves that seasonal success isn't the automatic indicator of state-level success it's at times framed as.

No. 9

Lucas Lovejoy

No. 9 Lucas Lovejoy (Lucas, TX) Prev. No. 4 - Down 5

State Result: 3rd in 5A

Emily Armstrong (So.) had the best race of her career. She finished eighth in 18:24.3, ahead of both Wortman and Sontag for the first time this season. Freshman Bronwyn Vaughan, who was Lovejoy's sixth runner in September, finished 23rd as their second scorer. Leila Thomas (Jr.) was 37th. Lily Fogle (Sr.) and Talia Orshalick (Sr.) finished 57th and 67th. 

Third place means Lovejoy still finds themselves on the podium, and third place is a healthy result they can be satisfied with.

No. 10

Northwest Nelson

No. 10 Northwest Nelson (Trophy Club, TX) Prev. No. 9 - Down 1

State Result: 7th in 6A

Nelson's season ended the way it went most of the year: a tight group without much separation. Elena Sather (Sr.) was 28th, Lyla Calaway (So.) 44th, and freshman Cheryl Bor 52nd. Audrey Pavlicek (Jr.) and Talia Ramirez (Sr.) finished 82nd and 83rd, a tenth of a second apart. The spread was 41.2 seconds, nearly the same as Carroll's.

Nelson were sixth at state last year and seventh this year. Calaway, Bor, and Pavlicek return. The core of a tight group is already in place for next fall. The next step is moving that group closer to the front.