XC Talk: Council Rock North

Key Returners: Mac Emery (Sr), Ross Wilson (Jr), James Zingarini (Sr)
Key Losses: Jack Felt, Forrest Kentwell
Notable Track Performances: Zingarini 4:18/9:50, Emery 4:28/9:11, Wilson 9:30/15:49

Council Rock North last year finished 6th place at the State Championship and returns their entire top 5, but that is just a small portion of why they have big upside this season. CR North had their best race at the end of the cross country season where they finished just 34 points back of Henderson at Hershey (compared to a roughly 150 point gap a week earlier). CR North was 4th at the District Championships at Lehigh but bested 2nd place Great Valley at the state meet by almost 20 points. When looking at the results, CR North's finish is even more impressive considering, due to sickness, Mac Emery finished outside the top 50 at the state championships. Zingarini came on strong at the end of the season becoming a very capable #2 runner for the team by states finishing in the top 40 and as just a sophomore Ross Wilson led the team with a top 20 finish at Districts and a top 40 finish at states.

On the track things continued to get better for CRN's big three. Emery rolled all season long leading to a huge 9:11 3200m mark this past spring. Zingarini continued to prove he was a top caliber guy and ran 4:18 on multiple occasions for 1600m. Wilson, who is clearly better over longer distances, added a sub 16 5k on the track early in the spring and ended his season under the SQS but unfortunately out of the top 8 in a deep field at Districts in the 3200m.

Council Rock North, a team that has made more state championships in a row than any other team in District One, has consistently found talent and trained it well. CR North's big three are all headed in the right direction and have had virtually 0 set backs besides Emery's sickness in the past year. I'm a huge fan of Zingarini this upcoming fall. He's my sleeper pick out of the big three, although I am a fan of all of them this spring. He has been rolling ever since Districts in XC and he continues to get better with every season.

But the big question people will have about CR North is will they be strong enough after the big three to win a state title. I see CR North as similar to this year's North Penn team but with a arguably a much stronger front 3. CR North, like North Penn, is well coached and trains hard and guys like Zac Keller and Marty Leonard may develop into the kind of finishers that Ryan Grace and Matt Molloy were for North Penn this past fall.

But CR North does not have a group of young JV runners who look like they are about to break out. The top 4 on their JV squad last year were all Juniors or Seniors and none of those top 4 runners finished under 17:50 on Lehigh's fast course. Henderson's entire top 8 from their JV squad did last year and that group included 6 freshman or sophomores. This makes Keller and Leonard (who will be a Junior next year and has potential to take the next step) the most likely guys to be the 4 and 5 men for CRNorth. Each man ran 17:08 last year at Districts and will need to drop into roughly the 16:30s range to help this team win a state championship is my guess. The CR North squad does have an up and coming youngster, Sean Griswold, who ran 10:21 for 3200m as a Freshman this past spring. If he has a big sophomore jump, which is not unheard of, he could be a nice piece to the puzzle.

Ultimately, the big three will make this team a contender, but they will go as far as their 4 and 5 guys can carry them. I can't see them competing at the same level as Henderson or O'Hara at this stage of the game unless O'Hara is struck by injury out front (Henderson seems to have enough depth to recover from an injury to anyone but Barchet and Russell and still compete for a state title). The advantage is at the state meet depth  matters less because there are not as many runners as districts who are scoring in the team race and can push the 4 and 5 guys points up.

This is my projected top 5 by season's end for CR North:
Emery (ET #12), Zingarini (ET #26), Wilson (ET #25), Leonard, Keller