Chasing perfection on October 15 in Ankeny, the Mid-Prairie middle school girls didn’t let expectations affect them in the 2A state championship race. 

Led by a top-10 individual finish by Marie Yoder, the Golden Hawks wrapped up an undefeated season with a state title, finishing 23 points ahead of runner-up Williamsburg with a winning score of 45. 

“It was a great day and we are so proud of the kids,” Mid-Prairie coach Melissa Fleming said. “The girls were pretty nervous about state and trying to keep their season undefeated. That can mess with their minds and their performances, but they still held it together nicely and didn’t let the pressure bother them too much.”

The Golden Hawk boys gave Mid-Prairie a pair of top-2 showings on Saturday, finishing state runner-up to Forest City. 

“This is the first time both boys and girls have ever scored in the top two at the state meet on the same day,” Fleming said. “Going into the meet, we knew both teams had a shot at placing very high. It was awesome to see them both do so well and come home with awards. Their hard work through the season paid off.”

Max Swartzentruber led the Mid-Prairie boys, finishing 20th out of 149 runners with a 2-mile time of 12:27. Reece Waters was 28th with a finish of 12:36 and Mason Wilson was two seconds behind him in 30th. Isaac Beachy broke the 13-minute mark for the first time, rounding out the Golden Hawk scoring with a 45th place time of 12:59. 

“The boys had a tight pack with only 32 seconds separating our first runner to our fourth,” Fleming said. “Our fifth and sixth runners were pushers and were able to score ahead of most of the teams’ fourth runner.”

Jonathon Pickard finished with a time of 13:26 and Sam Friessen set a new personal record of 13:27. 

“Sam Friessen had the biggest PR of the day, taking about seven seconds of his previous best mile pace, which he set on Tuesday,” Fleming said. 

While the competition brought out some great efforts on Saturday, the Ankeny course was not ideal for running the fastest times. 

“The course was in fairly poor condition, rutted, and rough,” Fleming explained. “That made running fast times pretty tough. We also ran out of our heads on Tuesday with most of the team getting a massive PR on Tuesday’s conference meet. That being said, we still had some kids get some new PRs to end their season and a number were fairly close.

“Gwen Wunderlich had the distinction of getting a new PR at every meet this season, including the state meet – which is something pretty hard to do.”

The Golden Hawk girls put four runners in the top 26 out of a field of 143 with 17 full teams. 

Yoder finished with a time of 13:24 to edge Davis County eighth grader Isabella Cooper for 10th place by less than two seconds. Tessa Brokaw and Rachel Hostetler were the sixth and seventh fastest seventh graders in the race, finishing 16th and 19th overall, respectively. Brokaw’s time was 13:38 and Hostetler finished in 13:45. Brooklyn Stutzman was the final scorer with a 26th place time of 14:07. 

“The team was pretty excited when the results finally came out and they found out they won,” Fleming said. “It was a great way to end their hard-working season.”

Kyrie Poll was the team’s fifth runner with a time of 15:31.

“They were a very fun group to coach, everyone worked hard throughout the year and really grew as runners,” said Mid-Prairie coach Jeremy Meyers. “It was really fun watching this group come together as a team and become so invested in each other’s success. You can tell they care about each other and want each other to do well.”

Girls Results      Boys Results