The Denver East Angels hosted the City League Championships on Wednesday at Denver City Park, and in all four races over the challenging course the Angels exceeded expectations.

Based on performances from earlier in the season, the Angels were underdogs for the team titles in three of four team races and two of four individual races. East came away from the meet with two team titles and three individual titles, and in all four races East scored fewer points than would have been predicted by earlier performance – a great indication of how well nearly every Angel showed up for Championship Season.

In the Boys JV race, Northfield High School was heavily favored and backed that up with a perfect 15-point score. But the East JV Boys got after it from the start and made the team from “Central Park” earn it. Juniors Jackson Gertge and Kyle Kojima gave no quarter in the first mile, and the two held on for 7^th and 8^th place in 18:35 and 18:38 respectively. Junior Mason Harper finished 11^th in 19:00 and freshman Tre Even was 14^th in 19:09, less than half a second back from the top freshman in the race. That gave the Angels four runners in the top-14, which was substantially better than anticipated. Sophomore Zach Smiles closed out the scoring for the Angels with his 26^th place finish in 19:43, securing 2^nd place for the Angels, one place better than 2023. Freshman Finley Knight was the next finisher for the Angels in 43^rd, the 9^th freshman overall in 20:56, junior Alexandros Mays was 45^th, and freshman Weston Dodson (10^th best freshman in the race) was 47^th.

Nobody can remember the last time the East Angels JV Girls didn’t win the City League team title. Because it has never happened. Ever. That was the challenge given to the East JV Girls as they faced a Northfield team that was favored to beat the Angels 23-30 if seasonal best times were to be believed. From early in the first mile, Angel runner Ivy Parish set the pace up front, and while a single Northfield runner gamely hung on to try to make a race of it, Parish eventually pulled away for a comfortable 17 second margin of victory in 20:42. Angel junior Mary Clare Nussbaum, somewhat typically for her, made the biggest moves up through the top-10 finishers to secure 3^rd place in 21:08. Ninth-graders Paola Ochoa and Ainslie Mohr also moved their way past Northfield runners in the middle mile and hung on for 5^th and 6^th place in 21:32 and 21:34. The Nighthawk girls would put the next eight runners across the line, but only the first five of them would count towards the team score, so when ninth grader Emma Maldonado-Ramos crossed the line in 22:54 in 15^th place, she was scored as 12^th place and the East Angels had secured another JV Girls team title, upsetting the Nighthawks 27-30. Sophomore Grey Jenson crossed the line in 23:57 for 26^th place for the Angels as their 6^th runner, and seniors Rae Tatel and Yelena Konowal ran 24:01 and 24:47 for 29^th and 34^th place.

The Northfield Boys Cross Country Team has earned the #5 ranking in Colorado 5A this season and came to the league meet not only heavily favored, but on paper looked like they could score as few as 20 points. However, recent history in the meet suggested that the East and South boys at least had a chance to make the race more competitive, and indeed, the race for the team title ended up being far more competitive. The first half of the race developed somewhat tactically, as a large group of boys including East senior Jonas Scudamore and junior Henry Bennet came through 2500m as a pack, with junior Isaiah Springer and senior Ben Brown not far behind. The race broke open between 3000m and 4000m, as the defending champion Scudamore steadily pulled away from the rest of the leaders to secure his second league title in 16:09. Bennett was able to grab 5^th place in 16:35 from that lead group, while Springer moved up to 10^th in 16:44 and Brown held on to 15^th in 17:05. Sophomore Emery Wagner, running his first race in more than three weeks coming off a potluck related injury, ran a great 2^nd half to take 21^st  in 17:24. Junior Abraham Morginsky finished 32^nd in 18:23 and senior Toby Penner 39^th in 19:02. As was the case last year, the Angels took third as a team, but this year the Angeles were far more competitive than anticipated and than they had been the year before, finishing with 51 points to Northfield’s 38 and South’s 44.

Times run at the Liberty Bell Invitational in mid-September indicated that the East Angel Girls Varsity (who unexplainably are no longer ranked in the top-10 in the State) were favored by just a single point over the Northfield Nighthawks. While the Nighthawks definitely field a really good team, the East coaches suspected that the Angels had made some favorable progress in the last month, and the results bore that out. Way, way out front, senior Rosie Mucharsky took a couple very swift victory laps on her own from the start to secure her 4^th league title. Because Parks and Recreation has forced changes to the East home course, there are no previous meet records, but 17:40 on this challenging course is definitely really fast. Delivering arguably the biggest surprise of the meet, sophomore Corrine Kennedy confidently moved past one of the best runners in the league over the last few years near the end of the second mile to take second place in 19:15. Juniors Julieta Ochoa and Scout Chomas executed the race plan excellently to take 4^th and 6^th for the Angels in 19:43 and 20:02. Sophomore Lola Carhart rose to the challenge of getting past all other teams’ 5^th best runner, racing into 9^th place overall in 20:09, while her classmate Avery Johnson, coming off injury and a more than three week break from racing, ran tough in the second half of the race to take 11^th in 20:16. Ninth grader Lila Brown, who was asked pre-race to stick with her “faster” teammates in the earlier part of the race even if it meant she would “blow-up” before the finish, did the former and not the latter, running a personal best on a course that does give these up easily, finishing in 20:18 for 13^th place. It was an emphatic win for the Angels, scoring a mere 22 points, half as many as the next team, and with all seven runners finishing with 1^st or 2^nd Team All-City honors.

The East Angel Varsity teams will take this momentum into the 5A Region 4 Championships on Thursday at Spring Canyon Park in Fort Collins. The top-4 teams and top-15 individuals will move on the Colorado State Meet. The Boys race at 2pm and the Girls at 2:30pm. Find meet information including course map here.

Boys: Scudamore, Bennett, Springer, Brown, Wagner, Morginsky, Gertge, Kojima, Harper

Girls: Mucharsky, Kennedy, J. Ochoa, Chomas, Carhart, Johnson, Brown, Nussbaum, P. Ochoa

Unofficial bus information: Leaving at 12pm. Alternates training with the team and other team members in good academic standing can get excused from school to attend meet and take bus, space allowing, per Coach Kohuth’s discretion, to support the team. Official bus information will be announced at practice or speak with Coach Kohuth.

Regional Team dinner on Wednesday for those competing and all alternates continuing to train with the team – check with coaches for details.