The 3A girls race was one of the wilder races of the day at the state meet with the unexpected happening and the expected not happening.
The individual race certainly projected to be fiercely competitive and wide open with a handful of legitimate contenders to cross the first line first.
Meanwhile, the reigning state team champions in Ponte Vedra appeared to be in the driver seat to repeat after a strong October of races including a runaway win at the FSU Pre-State Invitational.
The individual race played out with a large pack in the hunt for the first mile with a 5:33 split and dozen under 5:40 as well still many in the max thru the first loop at Apalachee Regional. However, the pack of leaders thinned out to a trio for the final loop with Leon senior Lillee Tang, American Heritage junior Ashley Fitzgerald and Rockledge junior Malinda Underwood gapping the rest and hitting the two mile mark in 11:29-11:30.
Fitzgerald and Underwood came into this season certainly as preseason favorites to contend for the 3A state title after strong track seasons with sub 11 minute performances for 3200 meters, while Tang had come on strong as of late with her 3A Region 1 and personal best 18:06 victory last week.
Tang and Fitzgerald would then separate from Underwood for the final mile and would press each other both under 18 minutes down the final straightaway with the local Tallahassee runner Tang making the last move for first place in a new PR of 17:53.
With Patrick Koon repeating as champion in the 3A boys race and Tang's win for the girls, Leon became only a handful of schools in state history to have boys and girls state champions in the same year.
For Fitzgerald finishing with her second sub 18 minute race of the season at ARP (17:53 at PRE-State) running the fifth fastest time of the day at 17:56, she also was the state runner-up in 3A for the second year in a row as she still seeks her first individual state title.
Fitzgerald was the top finisher from the 3A Region 4 runners, which was well represented with 5 of the top 7 and 6 of the top 8 finishers with her, Underwood (3rd, 18:15), Grace Finneran (4th, 18:18) of St. Thomas Aquinas, Olivia Fraga (5th, 18:20) of Our Lady of Lourdes, Christiana Coleman (6th, 18:31) of Dillard, and Addison Boyer (8th, 18:43) of South Fork.
While Tang's win was a mild surprise, the bigger shock out of the 3A race was the fact that not only did Ponte Vedra not repeat as the team champions but failed to be one of the top two teams on the podium in third place with 134 points after being ranked as the #1 team in the state of Florida regardless of classification just over two weeks ago.
Their team, especially their boys team was affected at the worst time by the flu bug going around and may have affected their overall team performances this weekend. But all of the varsity seven girls did indeed race for Ponte Vedra girls.
The Osceola girls were already chomping at the bits to grab the state title after a runner-up finish in 2021. They set the tone early one with a big lead thru the first mile by 57 points ahead of Ponte Vedra and kept rolling to the finish en route to their program's first ever state cross country team title with 101 points.
Their top 4 pack which has been stellar all season long delivered at the state meet led by an All-State PR race by senior Abigail Clements in 13th place at 18:47 and quickly followed into the finish by teammates Kennedy Downey (16th, 18:57), Elle Mehltretter (18th, 19:08), and Avery Latto (21st, 19:10).
Heloise Pinto also came through as the team's fifth runner dropping a personal best and first sub 20 minute race with a 19:51 clocking and 39th place finish.
Osceola may have knocked Ponte Vedra off from defending the state title, but a bigger surprise might have been by the team that knocked them off the podium completely in the Dillard girls.
Dillard, who have a lineup that includes several girls who were on their state record 4x800 meter relay from last spring in 9:03, showed their range extends far beyond the track with a 19:21 team average for their top 5 at the state meet to slide ahead of Ponte Vedra and only 19 points behind the state champions from Osceola with 120 points.
Their team performance in cross country should catapult this group to even greater things on the track. Christiana Coleman earned her second straight All-State individual honor with a 18:31 season best performance for sixth place to lead the Dillard girls. Raquel Edwards, their sub 2:10 half miler, ran a strong race as their #2 runner in 19:11 for 22nd place overall.
Three middle school grade level runners stepped up to fill out their remaining top 5 in sixth grader Miley Gill (31st, 19:34), eighth grader Peyton Williams (33rd, 19:40), and eighth grader Ja'liah Gammage (38th, 19:51).