Hopkins cross-country coach Brooke Brenner-Romph has a very different take on her teams’ performances in last Saturday’s Otsego Invitational. I reported it was a bad day for the Vikings, but she relayed the following:
“Our top three girls all ran their fastest times of the season. Kambria Moored and Nevaeh Helderop set the pace for the majority of the race (Jaeden Harshberger had the best individual placing for Hopkins). Jack Estelle was only two seconds shy of his overall personal best and he got bumped into a tree at the beginning of the race (he’s a freshman who duals varsity soccer and varsity cross country).
“The top six boys (who ran) that day are underclassmen. Twelve of the 17 who competed that day ran a season best or an overall personal best. We were competing against some of the top teams in the state, many of which are almost twice our size.
“The girls are currently second in the conference and this is the first time in years that I have been able to field a full boys’ team at every meet. Although Hopkins ‘as a team’ didn’t look that great on paper that day, they ran well and I am beyond proud of them.
“Please feel free to reach out via email to any of the local coaches to get their take on a competition. We would be happy to assist you with the details of any of our events.”
Ms. Brenner-Romph throughout the almost 11 years of Townbroadcast’s existence has been one of the more cooperative coaches about providing information. However, over the years, I have relied almost exclusively on Athletic.Net, which publishes statistics on a consistent basis about each dual meet and invitational.
Perhaps I misinterpreted the data provided about the Otsego meet. What I saw was a girls’ team that is second in the O-K Silver Conference finish 18th of 26 teams, the top two runners not in the top two that day, and a boys’ team that was 30th among 30 teams. I concluded that it was a bad day, which sometimes happens to even the best of teams.
I apologize most sincerely if my account was offensive to some. I have given up chasing down coaches to obtain information because too many of them are difficult to connect with, especially if they lose. Over the past 11 years, coaches’ cooperation has been dismal at best and I’m a one-man show who doesn’t have the time to chase down coaches and gather news at the same time.
Once again, Ms. Brenner-Romph has been one of the better coaches in this category, and we haven’t had a lot of problems in the past. At issue is my interpretation of the data.
Townbroadcast now is perhaps the only news outlet that consistently covers the Vikings and it will continue that commitment. Coaches who want information published only need to send the information (they don’t have to write an article) to dyoung880@gmail.com
