ANALYSIS

Girls - Division 2

The race for Division 2 City title has become a lot closer in the last month with arch rivals Bravo Medical and Eagle Rock scoring within 8 points of each other based on Prelim results. Through September Eagle Rock looked to be the obvious choice. But since then their # 3 runner, Elizabeth Corrigan, has not been running and since Mt. Sac their #5 runner, Tony Yetter, has been missing. Still, when we ran the numbers on the League Final results we had Eagle Rock on top. But at Prelims, where both teams ran on Pierce, Bravo Medical won on both time and points based on our hypothetical race. When we did a deeper dive on these teams we noticed that both Eagle Rock and Bravo Medical CURRENTLY have very similar team profiles; 2 front runners and 3rd-5th runners that run Pierce in the 22 minute range. This is a notoriously difficult profile to forecast, particularly In a large championship race, as the scoring tends to be highly variable. That said we are giving the nod to Bravo Medical. They won the Prelims on both time and points in their first effort on Pierce this year.

The race for the individual title looks to be Bravo Medical’s Angelica Milar. She looked like she was on cruise control in posting the 2nd fastest Prelim time (19:11.9) and winning her Prelim heat and race against some very fast competition from Venice, Palisades and Garfield. She may be the only Division 2 girl that breaks 19 minutes at Finals.

The race for 2nd place will be VERY interesting. Five girls have a legitimate claim to runner-up including Eagle Rock’s Keely Miyamoto and Celeste Corrigan, Venice’s Lidia Prokopovych-Shchepetkin and Elin Nowak, and Bravo Medical’s stand-out freshman Brynn Bogue. We’re discounting Keely’s rough patch at Prelims and giving her the nod for Division 2 runner-up.

Girls - Division 3

Canoga Park will win Division 3. . . .period! They have 4 runners in the top 10 and their team time is almost 9 minutes better than the runner-up.

Bernstein will take runner-up led by Central league champ Xenia Villarreal.

The individual title is all Dulce Gonzalez’s! She’s had a phenomenal senior year and is one of a hand-full of girls that has a chance to break 19 minutes at City Finals this Saturday. Her teammate Angelina Valdares has a shot at runner-up but will face stiff competition from Reseda’s Yanilette Montana who holds the edge. In head-to-head competition Yanilette has come out on top but it’s been close!

Girls - Division 4

LACES will win Division 4 by a landslide! Led by Kenna McConnachie (21:45.7-Pierce) the Unicorns have 3 girls ranked in the top 10 and a team time that 15 minutes faster than Rancho Dominguez’s converted Peck Park time. Even if were off on our conversion factors that should be plenty of buffer to give LACES the win.

Rancho Dominguez will have a fight on their hands for 2nd place from Mendez and Maywood Center. Ranking purely by the numbers Rancho has a very slight edge but in a big championship race Mendez has the better team profile so we’re going with Mendez for the runner-up spot in Division 4.

LACES Kenna McConnachie is the clear favorite for the individual Division 4 title. Northridge Academy’s Hannah Carlson looks to have a comfortable hold on the runner-up spot.

Girls - Division 5

The team title for Division 5 is a lock for New West. No one’s even in the same universe. Gala should easily take the team runner-up spot.

The individual race is the one to watch. New West’s sophomore Gabriela Nascimento ran 20:24.0 at Peck Park to win the Crosstown League Finals 2 weeks ago. The Peck Park course typically runs about a minute slower than Pierce. If she can run low 19’s at Pierce she is in rarefied territory. It’s the only race on record for Gabriela, including Track. so this one will be interesting!

The contest for runner-up in Division 5 will be New West’s freshman Kahri Sivkov and Lakeview Charter’s Tessa Solano who won the North Valley League Finals at Pierce. This is really a toss-up but we’re giving the edge to Karhi Sivkov for the Division 5 runner-up spot.