Though the Wayland boys’ varsity cross-country team sports only the minimum of five runners, it has managed to place fourth every time this fall in O-K Gold Conference meets.

The latest example was in the final league championship meet Wednesday at the Yankee Springs Recreation where the Wildcats, you guessed it, placed fourth. The girls’ squad, meanwhile, wasn’t quite as fortunate, settling for fifth.

It was a good race for Wayland senior Dylan Pallett, who emerged as O-K Gold individual runner-up with a time of 16:44.05, about 13 seconds behind league champ Jacob Draaisma of Middleville Thornapple Kellogg.

Ever-improving Ethan Manning also was among the league’s 10 best, checking i9n eighth with a 5K time of 18:04.87. Alberto Mandujando finished 13th in 18:26.98, Mason Fein was 16th in 18:38.52 and Aquimedes Miguel Garcia rounded out the scoring in 44th place.

Northview captured the Gold title with 52 team points and Tk checked in as runner-up.

Freshman Abree VanDenBrink finished 11th for the Wildcat girls in 21:23.88. Freshman Ashley Larsen was 22nd, Megan Stack was 27th, Sarah Osborn 28th and Heli Ryhaenen 35th.

South Christian was first and TK was second.