Taylor Sublette, a senior at Highland High School, led the Huskies with a third-place finish at a meet Sept. 8 in Keota.

She finished the course in 23 minutes, 45 seconds, trailing only Hannah Gus of BGM and Emma Wehrling of Iowa Valley.

“This has been a challenging course for her in the past and watching her run a great time and get a great placing was awesome,” said Highland coach Angie Strobel.

Sublette trimmed nearly two minutes from her time in the season-opening HIllcrest Academy Early Bird, where she finished 18th.

Two other Highland runners place among the top 15 in the girls varsity race in Keota. Katelyn Waters finished 13th with a time of 26:40 and Fiona Mahler was 15th with a time of 26:55. Waters trimmed her time from the 2019 Keota meet by nearly six minutes.

Two Lone Tree runners finished among the top 14 in the boys varsity race. Alberto Cortez placed eighth with a time of 19:43 and Nick Saltzman was 14th with a time of 20:18.

Jacob Rolling of Highland also had a strong race, finishing 18th with a time of 21:10, which was his best time on the Keota course and one of the top five times in his cross country career at any course.

“This is great for early in the season. I’m very proud of him,” Strobel said.

Bryson Graves of English Valleys won the boys race with a time of 17:07, beating runner-up Mason Moore of Sigourney by nearly a minute.

The middle school boys race featured three Mid-Prairie runners finishing among the top eight. Jayce Yoder of Mid-Prairie won the race with a time of 9:07, followed by teammate Emmett Swartzentruber in fourth place and Preston Yutzy in eighth place.

Dessa Poll of Mid-Prairie finished fifth in the middle school girls race with a time of 11:10, just seven seconds behind winner Allie Stell of North Mahaska. Vivian Zarbuba of Lone Tree was seventh.

Five Mid-Prairie runners finished among the top 14, including Poll, No. 9 Grace Puttman, No. 10 Anna Flynn, No. 12 Charlotte Sieren and No. 14 Ashlee Farrier.

Lone Tree’s Finley Jacque was 11th.

Fairfield invite

Rain and wet grounds canceled the scheduled meet this past Thursday in Fairfield.

Runners from HIllcrest Academy, Highland and Lone Tree were scheduled to compete.

Mid-Prairie

The Golden Hawks lost two meets last week due to the rain.

After an invitational at Monticello was canceled, the Hawks replaced that with a meet at Anamosa. Then, the Anamosa meet was also called off.

The Golden Hawks, who have won both the boys and girls team titles at their first two meets of the season, will compete Saturday at the Heartland Classic being held at Central College in Pella.

Danielle Hostetler, a freshman and younger sister of three-time state champion Marie Hostetler, is unbeaten in her first two meets.