Cross-Country: Winger girls battle illness and injury

Third-ranked (2A) East Ridge was too deep for the rest of the field at the Red Wing Invitational Friday at Red Wing High School, and the Wingers struggled with yet another runner missing competition.

The Raptors took first with 40 points, and Red Wing’s Elise Leise, who runs the Wingers’ second-lowest times as an eighth-grader, missed the meet with an illness, head coach Jesse Nelson said.

“We’ve just had some crummy luck,” he said. “It’s frustrating when these things happen to these kids. You want the kids to be running their best at all times.”

Roseville was second with 79 points and Northfield took third with 122 points. Red Wing finished 11th out of 13 teams.

“The girls field was really good; it was outstanding,” Nelson said.

Even as the sickness bugs, along with injury bugs, are dealt to Red Wing, junior Lindsay Scribner keeps putting up good times. She finished 19th in 15 minutes, 58.73 seconds.

“She’s really responded,” Nelson said. “She’s having the best times of her life. She’s been doing a lot with the Marines. I really think that’s helped her. She says she’s confident and she’s as strong as she’s ever been.”

Coming into the season, Scribner was supposed to combine with junior Kelsee Anderson to create a formidable duo for the Wingers, but Anderson has missed much of the season with a serious ankle injury.

“At the end of the summer, I was looking forward to the 1-2 punch we’d have with Lindsay and Kelsee,” Nelson said.

Anderson was within 14 seconds of qualifying for the Class 2A state cross-country meet at last season’s Section 1AA meet.

She finished 13th, with the top 10 runners advancing to state, and the goal of making state was fresh in her mind before starting this year.

But after being told she may not compete again until October, Anderson is just happy to be back competing. She finished 60th Friday with her ankle and much of her leg covered in tape and brace.

“I was just devastated when the doctor told me I might not be back until October,” she said. “It’s definitely really nice to be getting back. … All you can do is look forward and look at the positives.”

The pain is still pretty bad, she said, as she hobbled around much of the course Friday.

“My times aren’t where I want them,” Anderson said. “Then again, I’m also out of shape because I hadn’t run in a month. But you got to start somewhere I guess. … I’m just listening to my body right now.”

Red Wing sophomore Adrienne Hicks and junior Hailee Johnson came in 75th and 76th, respectively. Eighth-grader Adelle DeSutter came in 78th in 17:49.15.

“When one person goes down, some other kids fill in for them,” Nelson said. “We finished where we did and now we get back to work. We have a really good meet with Chaska (Tuesday).”

Tuesday’s meet will feature a large field with big schools, an area that caused issues for the Wingers in the past, Nelson said.

“It’ll be a huge meet,” he said. “We need to become a better big meet team. I don’t know if it is intimidation or what it is but we’re going to fix it.”

Tags: cross-country, red wing, sports, prep