The Wayland boys’ varsity cross-country team took a respectable third place Thursday in the Delton Kellogg Invitational.
The Wildcats finished with 85 team points, behind Covenant Christian and Kalamazoo Christian in the 11-team field.
Perhaps the biggest reason for the much-improved overall performance from 24 hours earlier, was a breakout effort by sophomore James Butler, who eclipsed the 20-minute mark for the first time to take 28th individually.
Meanwhile, junior Devin Weaver led the Wayland pack by finishing sixth in his season best of 17:54.95 over the five-kilometer course. Travis Koon was 14th in 18:35.23, freshman Dylan Pallett continued his strong outings by taking 17th in 18:39.69 and sophomore Henry Oudbier was 20th in 18:58.28.
The Lady Wildcats had a tougher time, tying for fifth with host Delton with 139 points. Hopkins grabbed fourth placed among the 10 teams with 135. Covenant Christian and Kalamazoo Christian went 1-2.
Wildcat junior Olivia Barabas was individual runner-up with a time of 20:48.5 and sophomore Helena Kerber was fifth in 21:17.75 for the Lady Vikings, followed by freshman Kambria Moored in 16th, Neveah Helderop 32nd, Jaeden Harshberger 55th and Abigail Zalis 66th.
Rounding out Wayland’s scoring were sophomore Elliot Antel 30th, Emily Tuinstra 40th and Mackenzie VanderWeide 41st.
