Lady Bruins qualify for sectionals

The St. Bede Lady Bruins were able to sneak in with the fifth and final qualifying team position in Saturday’s 1A Seneca cross country regional.

Sophomore Kayla MacDavitt came over from the volleyball squad to lead the Lady Bruins with an 11th-place time of 23 minutes and 28 seconds. Right behind was senior Lucy Stanke in 13th place in 23:52.

Also scoring for the lady Bruins were 20th Hannah Read (24:26), 31st Jenna Ebener (27:18) and 32nd Amy Stanke (28:14).

Aurora Christian took top team honors, led by first-place finisher Sarina Oleson (21:25).

Putnam County, which finished sixth place with 137 points, qualified two runners — sophomores Brianna Downey (23rd, 24:31.7) and Abby Nieslawski (26th, 25:20.6).

Ottawa Marquette, led by race winner Evan Darm (17:30.4), captured the boys’ team title by defeating runner-up Aurora Christian 29-45.

St. Bede finished eighth of nine teams and did not qualify one to sectional. Top Bruins runners were 34th Szymon Ligas (21:00), 40th Ayethaw Tun (21:40) and 42nd Connor Armstrong (21:57).

Volleyball

Bureau Valley placed third in the Silver Division of the Westwood Freshmen volleyball tournament. The  Storm defeated Dixon and Byron and lost to Belvidere North in pool play. BV lost to Kewanee and then beat Streator to take third in its division.

Whitney Forward led the Storm with 35 points and 13 aces with Danae Ross adding 13 points and six kills, Emily Phillips 11 points, five aces and eight kills and Bri Smith nine points, three aces and three kills.

Sophomore football

Princeton 38, Orion 38: The Princeton sophomores took turns exchanging touchdowns with Orion Saturday and when the final horn blew, they ended in a tie.    

PHS running back Alex Rico was a wrecking ball, rushing for four touchdowns and 290 yards and returning a kickoff for a 90-yard score. He had a total of 416 all-purpose yards.

Rico’s 90-yard return tied the game at 30. QB Southern Foster ran the conversion in, jumping over an Orion defender at the goalline for the two points. Foster had three conversion runs and threw for another to Earl Towne.

PHS coach Dan Foes called it a “fitting ending for two teams that played their hearts out. I am very proud of how the sophomore Tigers have matured throughout the season. We had our ups and downs but we kept working to improve all the way through the last play of the season.”