2014 Season outlook

Senior Ryan Clevenger and his Downers Grove North boys cross country teammates seemed to many to emerge out of nowhere and finish a program-best second at the 2013 state meet.

While Clevenger is among the favorites for the individual state title Nov. 8 at Peoria’s Detweiller Park, the Trojans once again have embraced their role of being underdogs as a team.

“We’ll be doing some more sneaking this year,” said Clevenger, seventh at state in 2013. “People expect us to not be as good this year. I wouldn’t blame them. They probably thought it was a one-time thing, second one year and then you probably just fall off from there.”

In the 3A state pre-season polls, the Trojans were ranked No. 13 by MileSplit Illinois and No. 21 by DyeStat Illinois.

The Trojans began to unveil what they have in store by winning their season opener at home Aug. 27 over four other teams at Greene Valley Forest Preserve. Their first big invite test comes Sept. 6 at St. Charles East.

Clevenger and seniors Jack Diamond and Zac Christensen return from the seven-runner state lineup, but the Trojans did graduate four of their top-five finishers at state.

Graduated two-time all-stater Zack Smith finished third overall (14:23 for 3.0 miles) to graduated O’Fallon standout Patrick Perrier (14:21) with the fastest Detweiller time in Downers North program history.

Clevenger was seventh (14:38), five seconds from a top-five finish, followed by graduated Marc Mathy (34th, 15:08), Jeremy Craven (68th, 15:24) and Jared Spilky (77th, 15:29). Christensen (114th, 15:41) and Diamond (184th, 16:16) were the Trojans’ No. 6 and 7 finishers.

Also back from among the five state meet alternates are senior Joe Carter and sophomore Alec Danner. Both showed signs of vast improvement at the EIU Showdown by finishing sixth and second overall, respectively, in a race won by Clevenger.

“Top five (at state as a team) is pretty doable. I think that’s a reasonable goal for us,” Downers North coach John Sipple said. “We have question marks for sure, but we should be a top-10 team, we should qualify for the state meet. I think if stuff goes great, we could get another (top-three) trophy and the guys have set the expectation that high. I’d be surprised if a lot of people in the state would think that about our squad. I don’t think a lot of people will see us coming along until we start posting some times (in races).”

In 2013, Downers North came along slowly but surely but didn’t compete at full strength at any major race until the postseason. After the season opener, Craven cross trained until the West Suburban Conference Silver Division Meet because of a stress fracture, and that was to win the junior varsity race. Spilky also missed some competition because of injury.

The Trojans’ progress was further clouded by competing so often against eventual first-time state champion Hinsdale Central and fellow perennial Silver powers York and Lyons Township. Downers North was third at the Silver Meet to York and Hinsdale Central to earn a tie for third with LT in the final overall standings. Downers North then was second to Hinsdale Central at the LT Regional and Hinsdale Central Sectional.

At state, the Red Devils (99 points) won easily with five finishers among the top 29, followed by the Trojans (144) and third-place O’Fallon (157). With LT (190) and York (196) also fourth and fifth, it was the conference’s greatest overall day at state.

“Last year, everyone knew we had a lot of seniors in our top seven. Some people knew to look out for us. This year, we’re a lot more under the radar,” Diamond said. “I think it’s going to be easy for us to work our way up through the pack in some meets and I think it’s going to be fun to go under the radar this year, surprise some people the first couple of weeks of the season. We’re real excited to show some people what we’re made of, hopefully make some noise, be better than expected.”

2013 also saw Clevenger emerge individually as a formidable frontrunner to create a powerful duo with Smith. While the pair had one of their biggest gaps in a race at state, Clevenger still finished behind only two non-seniors – McHenry senior Jesse Reiser (2nd, 14:22) and Conant senior Zach Dale (4th, 14:31). Palatine senior Graham Brown was eighth (14:41), three seconds behind Clevenger.

“I’ll be a contender but it’s mainly about getting the one point for the team (by winning). Wherever I finish at state, it’s about trying to get the least amount of points so we can trophy again,” Clevenger said.

“I want to win state. That’s probably the main goal, but the team aspect of this thing is bigger than that. It fuels the whole thing. Whenever we’re doing workouts, one of my friends, (senior) Dillon Murphy, is like, ‘Jesse (Reiser) is up there. It helps motivate me to keep going or to keep pushing.”

Clevenger can join an elite group of multiple all-staters for Downers North. Smith, who was eighth at state as a junior. Ed Borjon, Tony Laskowski, Luke Ryan and Ben Silver are the program’s only runners to earn top-25, all-state honors twice. Before last season, Downers North’s highest individual state finish was sixth by Borjon (2000) and Laskowski (1987).

“Ryan is definitely talked about as a guy who could potentially win. For sure, he’s one of the top dudes with Jesse Reiser and Zach Dale and maybe Grant Brown and (Lake Zurich sophomore Matt Pereira),” Sipple said. “I think he’ll run sub-14:10 at Detweiller – when we get him there healthy. If you’re doing that, you’re right there.”

The momentum of state cross country also carried over to one of the best track seasons in program history. Clevenger enjoyed two all-state performances. Clevenger finished third in the 1,600-meter run (4:11.20) and anchored the all-state, eighth-place 3,200 relay with Diamond, Christensen and graduated Tony Zea (7:47.95). Smith was ninth in the 1,600 (4:14.82) after earlier being sixth in the 3,200 (9:19.75).

“Besides kind of being the underdogs and people not knowing about us, I think our competitive edge and the way that we train (are team strengths),” Christensen said. “Clearly, we did lose a couple of key runners from last year, but even just knowing how to train at that level and knowing that we can still compete at the same level is enough to kind of push us and make sure that we all train the way that we can and train well, listen to our coaches, focus on doing things we’re supposed to do.”

Competing and training as often as Diamond and Christensen did with Smith, Zea and Clevenger during the track season began their transition into becoming captains and team leaders for cross country.

“It was still nervewracking to go to state (cross country as juniors), but there wasn’t any pressure for us to score because we knew that our top five were going to get it done,” Diamond said. “This year, we’re definitely excited to take charge, move up in the pack, and hopefully we’ll be around that 25th place, all-state mark, and score some low points for our team because we’re actually going to make a big difference.”

Depth still probably will be a concern for the varsity, but perhaps not in years to come. Last season’s success has contributed to nearly half of this season’s 46 runners being freshmen.

“It’s a huge influx of young kids, which is great, so there’s a lot of learning going on by those guys,” Sipple said.

At the 3,200-meter team time trial Aug. 15 on the school track, Clevenger was first (9:17.04), and Diamond (9:54.34), Christensen (9:56.64) and Danner (9:57.64) also broke 10:00.

Sipple said Carter (10:18.94) may also have broken 10:00 if he hadn’t taken the first mile out too fast.

“To have five guys sub-10:00 before the racing season, that’s a great sign for us,” Sipple said. “Now we had a bunch of guys at 10:10 or better (last year). This year, it’s a small amount of guys at that elite level.”

The next three finishers were seniors Jack McGinnis and Bruce Tamlin and junior Brad Wilcoxen between 10:39 and 10:42. Tamlin made huge strides in his first cross country season as a junior, and Sipple is hoping more consistent training this fall should help him to continue dropping time.

“We could potentially have five or six guys at 15:30 or better at Detweiller by November,” Sipple said. “We have some pretty elite guys that’ll be able compete at that same, similar level that we were at last year. I think that’ll surprise some people. It helps, too, that we have Clevenger banging up front for us.”

“Honestly, we expect ourselves to maybe match what we did last year. First things first, we’re going to go to the sectional and do our best there,” Diamond said. “It doesn’t matter where our No. 1 man is (at state), more importantly that our No. 5 man and No. 2 man finish right next to each. That’s most important, our No. 5 man.”

-- by Bill Stone