NHS Girls’ Cross Country Wins Another Title —

Quite A Run Of Success — Hawks Dig Deep, Win Seventh Straight Crown

By Andy Hutchison

BETHEL — Doug Russell added up the scores from the final tally sheet and knew his Newtown High School girls’ cross country team had won its seventh straight South-West Conference championship.

The runners, although they were aware that things were looking pretty good based on their strong individual finishes, did not know for sure that they had won until the announcement was made over the public address system at Bethel High School on Thursday.

Russell wanted the girls to find out that way, and when they did, there were screams of joy from those wearing blue and gold.

Newtown finished with 75 points and runner-up New Milford had 81.

“I knew it was going to be close,” Newtown’s top runner, Anne Martino, said. “We are all so happy.”

Winning has become customary for the NHS girls, but this race was not a given for the young squad. Last year’s team graduated five of its top seven runners and this year’s squad had to overcome New Milford and New Fairfield — the only teams to beat the Hawks in the regular, dual meet season. Despite the rebuilding process the Hawks underwent this fall, Russell believed his team could come out on top.

“The way we were working, we had the capability to pull this off,” Russell said. “[Thursday] I think they reached down a little further, dug a little deeper, and ran exceptionally.”

Newtown showed off its depth with five top-20 finishers, which enabled the Nighthawks to overtake New Milford. Of the seven competitors for each school, only the results of the top five count. Immaculate High’s Moira Kenny led the field with time of 19:01.82, nearly 44 seconds faster than the next finisher. Newtown’s top runner was Martino (fifth overall in 20:27.86, which qualifies her for the All-SWC First-Team).

During the preseason, NHS captain Kelley Anne Carney said people should expect the unexpected with this squad. The unexpected at last week’s SWC championships turned out to be the emergence of some of the younger runners who moved up in the pack by placing higher than they had throughout the season.

Freshman Katie Burns, the team’s fifth-place finisher throughout the season, got better and better along with her teammates as the season progressed. She then took 2:05 off her time from the first meet back in early September, to place second among Newtown racers and 15th overall in a time of 21:33.54 at the SWC race.

“It was great — I really didn’t expect it,” Burns said.

Rounding out the top five for Newtown were: Mara Scallon, 16th in 21:34.94; Erin Begg, 19th in 21:50.14, and Natalie Villa, 20th in 21:52.83.

“We all wanted to do it for each other,” said Villa, a senior, whose sister, sophomore Dani Villa, also ran in the SWC race along with Lila Kohrman-Glaser.

“I love running with Natalie. It’s such a huge inspiration watching her work so hard,” Dani Villa added.