Rosalea Kimball doesn’t want to sound over-confident, but she knows it’s tough to ignore what her Maranacook cross country teams could accomplish with big performances Saturday at the Kennebec Valley Athletic Conference Class B championship meet.

“A lot can happen,” she said, “and you never know who else could have career days. But at the same time I think both of our teams have a shot at doing really, really well this weekend. We have some very strong teams.”

The KVAC A and B championship meets will be held at 11 a.m. Saturday at Cony High School. The Mountain Valley Conference championship meets are also Saturday, beginning at 10 a.m. at the University of Maine at Augusta. Monmouth and Winthrop could challenge Boothbay and others for team titles.

The Lewiston boys are favored to defend their KVAC A title while the Brunswick girls should contend for the girls crown. The Maranacook boys are chasing their third consecutive KVAC B title.

Maranacook will challenge Camden Hills for the girls title.

Austin Landry and Jason Stevenson lead the Black Bears, who are coming off a strong showing at the Mt. Blue Relays last week. The Black Bears were the first Class B team to finish.

“Our top 10 runners are going very well,” Kimball said. “We’re peaking at the right time. If we all have a good day, I think we have a good shot at winning it. Austin and Jason will go out there and try to do what they’ve been doing. They’ve been consistent all year.”

Luca DeAngelis, Colby Watts, Ethan Harriman and John Parent are all running well for Maranacook.
Hannah Despres leads the Maranacook girls. She finished fifth at the Mt. Blue Relays, but Kimball said the Black Bears will need a few other runners to shine Saturday.

Erin Guilmet, Sydney Green, Angel Abbott, Jaycee Greeley, Taylor Cray and Melissa Garand are all capable of strong showings.

“Camden Hills is tough,” Kimball said. “If we both come out at full strength, it will be a very good race. We both have a shot at it. Hannah has been our No. 1 all season but our big goal is to close the gap. We have a lot of girls who can step into that position. We have a lot of depth.”

The Mt. Blue girls and boys are poised for strong showings in the KVAC A meet. The boys, led by Aaron Willingham and Josh Horne, lost by .41 seconds to Bangor at the Relays last week. 

“It was absolutely phenomenal that they ended up with the day they had,” Mt. Blue coach Kelley Cullenberg said. “We’re looking forward to Saturday.”

The Mt. Blue girls finished second to Maranacook last week. Sarah Wade, Maggie Hickey and Katherine Gunther lead the Mt. Blue girls.

“We’re feeling pretty uplifted,” Cullenberg said. “We’ll be ready.”

The MVC championships get under way at 10 a.m. with the girls race. The boys are expected to follow at 10:45.

Boothbay is favored to win the boys title, but Monmouth and Winthrop should be in the mix.

“I don’t think anyone is catching Boothbay at this point,” Winthrop coach Ed Van Tassel said. “They are deep and they are fast. They don’t have a true No. 1 runner but they are deep. They look like the team to beat. But you never know. But if we can bet out Monmouth we feel like we can be second in Western Maine. That would be a step in right direction.”

The girls race is wide open, with Boothbay, Lisbon and Monmouth the expected frontrunners.
“Those three teams have separated themselves,” Van Tassel said.

Bill Stewart — 621-5640
bstewart@centralmaine.com