Senior Marissa Williams talks about winning at City prelims and signing with Cal.
Marissa Williams ran the fastest overall time and the Palisades High girls varsity cross country team established itself as the one to chase after winning its heat at Thursday’s City Section cross country preliminaries.
Running the 2.9-mile course at Pierce College for the first time this season, Williams clocked 17:16.69 and will try for her third straight individual title next Saturday. She and the Dolphins also look warmed up to defend their team championship.
“I kind of forgot everything but I kept following the arrows,” Williams said. “It wasn’t a great time — I could’ve done better, but hopefully next week I’ll improve. I like our team’s chances because everyone’s gotten better.”
Seniors Natalie Marsh (19:15.35) and Hannah de Silva (19:26.24) were second and third, respectively, giving the Dolphins a sweep of the top three places. Occupying the eighth through 10th positions were Pali High sophomores Shannon Lee (20:08.93), JJ Wittbrodt (20:11.57) and Chelsea Levi (20:23.66), for a team total of 23 points — far outdistancing Bravo (71) and Birmingham (76).
Granada Hills, which finished second to Palisades by a single point last year, won the second heat with 37 points and West Valley League rival Taft won the third heat with 30 points.
Pali High’s boys varsity also qualified for the finals, finishing second in its heat with 63 points. Sophomore Jakob Pollack (16:09.36) was fourth and freshman Ben Hamer (16:23.74) was sixth in the race, which was won by Jordy Ceja of Birmingham in 15:44.32.
Senior Shane Brouwer was 14th in 16:40.54, sophomore Jack Hockley was 18th in 17:10.26, sophomore Jonathan Flores was 22nd in 17:20.24, senior Andres Gomez (18:00.43) was 31st and junior Connor Smith finished 32nd in 18:05.09.
Granada Hills placed five runners in the top 12 to win the heat with 61 points.
The fastest time overall belonged to Paul Luevano of Venice, who ran 15:15.53 in the second heat, which Santee won with 35 points, one less than Marshall. El Camino Real had four of the top six runners — including the top three — to win the third heat with 26 points.
Palisades nearly swept the Western League finals at Elysian Park a week before City prelims — winning every race except the JV boys division — and Coach Bob Macias was pleased with Thursday’s results, although he knows anything can happen in the finals.
“Some of the other teams didn’t run as well today but that doesn’t mean much — we need to run well next Saturday — it’s as simple as that,” Macias said. “Same thing for the boys. They have to run well and I don’t think they’ve run their best yet.”
— Steve Galluzzo
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