Waggy claims first as cross country Bucs take second place in Polar Bear Invitational

FAIRMONT – Buckhannon-Upshur’s Jack Waggy outpaced 60 other runners to win the Polar Bear Invitational Saturday afternoon.

Waggy ran a winning time of 16:17.3.

All five Bucs scoring finished in the top 20 as Jordan Gillum placed sixth (16:59.3), Reis Leonard took seventh (17:04.9), Joey Nolte in 17^th (18:06.6) and Owen Cutright in 18^th (18:13.5).

The team standings were incredibly close as the Bucs took second with 49 points, just one point behind champion East Fairmont who amassed 48 points. Fairmont Senior was a point behind the Bucs in third place with 50 points.

“I’ve never been part of a race where it was this close,” stated Buckhannon-Upshur head coach Taylor Stacy.

The other Bucs running were Alex Sappey in 21^st (18:49.4), Brycen Allen in 32^nd (19:56.3), Weldon Zirkle in 38^th (20:11.0), Jeremy Allman in 42^nd (20:48.1) and Brandon Landis in 44^th (21:13.8).

The event was the regular-season finale for the Bucs who will now move onto the Big 10 Conference and Regional championships in the next three weeks.

“Saturday was a good close to our regular season,” Stacy said. “We’re feeling good going into the championship season in a couple of weeks. I think the boys are in a great position to run their best races at the end of the season. The boys have had some great efforts from our fourth and fifth runners. I’m excited to see how we perform at Big 10 Conference championships.”

The Bucs will be back in action next Thursday in the Big 10 Conference championships at Kingwood.