Nicole Rasmussen and Daniel Danforth were named Most Valuable Runners for the Sweet Home cross-country team at its awards potluck Thursday, Nov. 10.
Rasmussen, a sophomore, finished sixth in the state Nov. 5 after winning the Sky-Em District Championship a week earlier.
“Nicole started going to the front this season and found out she belonged there,” Coach Billy Snow said, adding that Rasmussen met nearly all the goals they had set for her this season. She has been invited to run the Border Clash cross-country meet at the Nike campus in Beaverton Sunday, Nov. 20, which pits the best runners from Oregon and Washington against each other.
“After that we’ll sit down and decide what she wants to do next,” he said.
Danforth, a junior, finished second to teammate and district champion Nick Hall in the Sky-Em championships, then finished 27th at state. He was the Huskies’ frontrunner in six of the Huskies races.
“Daniel has a lot of untapped talent in there,” Snow said. “He’s not afraid to run to the front.”
Rookies of the year were senior Sarah Wyatt and freshman Jakob Hiett. Wyatt, who has played basketball and softball for three years at Sweet Home, decided to try cross-country midway through the season and rapidly rose to become the Huskies’ third runner, helping them to their third straight state team berth, despite suffering from asthma and walking pneumonia.
Hiett finished the season as the third-fastest freshman in the 4A division and second-fastest in the state championship race, trailing Siuslaw’s Seth Campbell by 16 seconds.
Ramussen and Daniel were both named to Ironman Awards, given to the runners who miss the fewest practices; they were present for every workout, Snow said.
Most Improved went to freshman Trevor Melson and senior AnneMarie Miller, both brand new to high school sports. Miller cut 11 ½ minutes off her best 5000-meter time as she moved to faster courses and got more experience, and Melson reduced his by six.
“They both came a long way,” Snow said.
Most Inspirational went to Melson and Kimber Swanson, for demonstrating consistent competitive spirit on “game day.”
Will to Win – runners who prepare themselves to win “day in, day out,” who are willing to work, went to Paige Sanders and Hall.
Snow said the 2011 season was “very different” than other recent years, in which the Husky girls have had five straight district individual champions and have become regular qualifiers for the state meet, winning their first team trophy in school history– fourth place – last year.
“Out of our 21 kids, seven had prior cross-country varsity experience. We had some kids from track who had never run cross-country, but track and cross-country are very different beasts. We had a very young team. I really had no clue what to expect.
“What I found I had was a very fun team. We had to find talent and put it together, but we have come a long, long way.”
The only fourth-year letter winner was Hall. Third-year letters went to Danforth and Sanders, who, Snow said, “really stepped it up this year,” setting personal-best times for courses she’d run before that were a minute to 90 seconds faster down the line. “She started fulfilling the potential I and other coaches thought she had,” Snow said.
Second-year winners were Rasmussen and Swanson, who, Snow said, provided leadership for the girls team as it came together with all but four of its runners first-time cross-country competitors.
“She did the things I couldn’t do as a coach,” he said.
First-year letter recipients were: Hiett, sophomores David Johnson, Nick Mattson and Ian Wingo – the “Three Musketeers, as Snow calls them, who ran as a pack for most of the season; seniors Wyatt, Miller, Laura Hoy and Trysta Lewelling, who were all rookies this year; and junior Tashana Mithen, who came on strong at the end of the season, the only Husky to post a personal-best 5000 time on the slow state championships course.
Junior varsity certificate winners were freshmen Sierrah Owen and Elise Holden, junior Candolyn Johnson, Melson and senior Ryan Blackwell, who, Snow noted, is “built like a linebacker,” but joined the team to get in shape after signing up to join the Army.