Red Cloud – On Friday, Red Cloud hosted the Region 5A cross country run and for the first time in the school’s history, Red Cloud qualified both their boy’s and girl’s teams to State as Desirae Blacksmith completed the 4,000 meter course in 18:23 for 9 th, Saige Pourier was 12 th in 18:32, Ida Clarke 15th and Lariah High Hawk, a sophomore, finished 18 th giving the Lady Crusaders 54 points, third in the team competition. Custer, with 19, took first and Todd County, with 30, took second. Red Cloud’s Billie White was 26 th, Laree Pourier was 29 th. Lottie Grimshaw, a seventh grader at Todd County won the girls with a 12:10.

James Pine, a freshman, led the Red Cloud boys with an eighth place finish in 17:43, Wade O’Bryan was 13 th in 18:12, Lester Gotheridge was 15 th and Kyle Blacksmith finished 23 rd for a total of 59 for the Crusaders, good for third behind Hill City’s 28 and Todd County’s 49. Kylie Weston, a freshman took 25 th and Chante Knight, a senior, was 29 th. Eamin Entwisle of Hot Springs took individual honors with a time of 16:12.

“This means a lot for our cross country program,” said Matt Rama, in his second year as head coach, “we have some student athletes who are doing another sport as well; cross country is not a glamour sport and having both the girl’s and the boy’s team qualify is a testament to their hard work, with their success, maybe more of our students will see this as an opportunity to get involved in a sport like cross country.”

The State Cross Country meet is set for Huron on Saturday, Oct. 20 at the Broadland Creek National Golf Course. The State B girls run at 1pm, B boys at 1:30pm, A girls at 2pm, A boys at 2:30pm, AA girls at 3pm and AA boys at 4:15pm.