Fairfield Lions win back-to-back regional championships
Two years in a row, the Fairfield Lions keep adding to their program’s prestige by winning a Division III Regional championship, placing first at Pickerington North High School, plus stamping their ticket to the OHSAA State Tournament for the fifth consecutive year.
Fairfield had the team accomplishments — including being the first Fairfield team to win back-to-back regional championships — but also had the individual regional runner-up with senior Noah Richmond averaging a 5:18.2 mile for a second-place time of 16:28.40.
As a team, the Lions placed first for the second consecutive year with a total of 75 points, resulting in a total team time of 1:25:22.75 and an average time of 17:04.55.
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The Lions — who were also Southern Hills Athletic Conference champions and district champions for the past seven years — had two runners place in the Top 4, with not only Richmond being second place, but fellow senior Matthew Mangus placing fourth overall with a time of 16:39.46, resulting in an average mile time of 16:39.46.
FHS junior Austin Setty placed 25th overall with a time of 17:16.15 (5:33.5 average mile), while junior Bennett Hodson was 28th place at 17:21.25, as his average mile time was 5:35.2.
Freshman Cohen Frost was 35th overall in his first regional appearance, gaining the spot with a time of 17:37.49 (5:40.4 average mile). In 40th place was sophomore Ethan Davis at 17:43.61 (5:42.4 average mile), and in 42nd was senior Andrew Davis with a time of 17:45.13 (5:42.9 average mile).
"I was very happy the boys came away with the win," FHS coach Raymond Friend said. "The strength of our team is the fact that all seven of our runners beat every other teams fifth runner.
"Noah and Matthew really showed up. They are our senior leaders and they were excellent in these muddy conditions. Our freshman, Cohen Frost came up big and was our No. 5 runner. Next week could come down to if my underclassmen can rise the occasion and I fully believe that they will."
In all, there were 129 runners and 16 full teams in the event. Following the Lions in team scoring was Columbus Academy in second place with 84 points (1:25:25:98), and third place was Mount Gilead (1:26:05.43).
Fourth place went to Grandview Heights (114), and in fifth place was Fredericktown (139). The rest of the Top 10 included: Garaway (178), Trimble (187), Caldwell (189), Northmor (219) and Elgin (263).
Eleventh place through 16th place were Newark Catholic (285), Belpre (297), Minford (320), Barnesville (358), Franklin Furnace Green (399) and West Union (444).
With the regional championship, the Lions have one final race left in the season, that being the Division III OHSAA State Tournament. This will be the fifth consecutive year the Lions will race at state as a team and the seventh consecutive year they will have runners at the state race.
In 2016, the Lions were fourth place overall with four runners from that team competing in Saturday’s regional race.
The 2017 Division III State Tournament boys race will start at 1:30 p.m. at the National Trail Raceway on Saturday, Nov. 4.
For complete results of the regional race, click here.