Cross Country: Four Schools Win at Arabia Mountain Meet

By Mark Brock

The last regular season meet in DeKalb County was run on Tuesday at Arabia Mountain and four different schools picked up race wins as they prepare for the county championships.

Redan and Stephenson split the opening boys’ and girls’ races with one-two finishes on the day.The Raiders place five runners in the Top 10 finishers to outscore Stephenson 23-59 in the boys’ race while Arabia Mountain finished a close third with 61 points.

Redan swept the top three places in the race led by juniors Keith Terry (19:18.06) and Cedric Roberts (19:29.00) finished first and second, respectively, while running a pair of Top 10 times for the season at Arabia Mountain. Sophomore Earnest McNease was third with a time of 20:28.33.

Senior Ian Grandison was seventh in 22:19.33 and senior Alex Gary was 10th in 23:14.46 to round out the Redan top five runners.

Stephenson was led by a fourth place finish from Chaz Berry in 20:37.04 and finished with three in the Top 10. Junior Liban Mohamoud (22:19.63) and Jarrett Williams (22:38.85) were eighth and ninth, respectively.

Arabia Mountain seniors Cornell Mattox (21:34.56) and Alema Favors (21:51.38) came across the line in fifth and sixth.

Stephenson nipped Redan 32-36 to win the girls’ opening race of the day as four runners finished in the Top 10 for the Lady Jaguars.

Redan sophomore Tanzanie Brown (24:20.54) was the individual winner while Arabia Mountain’s Matoaka Willson (26:05.44) was second.

Stephenson had the next three runners to finish in senior Darien Johnson (28:35.08), sophomore Sarah Lovett (28:49.99) and senior Nyah Muhammad (29:42.18).

Stone Mountain took the second boys’ race of the afternoon 23-41 over Tucker by placing six runners in the Top 10 led by the one-two finish of sophomore Matthew Felder (20:18.76) and senior Andrew Detherow (20:35.62).

Junior Chris Jones (21:24.47) was fifth, senior Demani Walker (21:33.65) was sixth, junior Marc Chishibanji (22:36.25) was ninth and German Ruiz (22:43.68) was 10th to solidify Stone Mountain’s win.

Tucker put three runners in the Top 10 led by freshman Jared Kubik (21:13.56) in third and senior Ryan Strickland (21:15.56) in fourth. Sophomore Robel Shiberu was seventh in a time of 21:55.27.

Columbia’s Telahjwon Cooper was eighth in 22:16.61 to round out the Top 10 finishers. The Columbia Lady Eagles won their second consecutive race of the season as four runners finished in the Top 10 for a 37-49 win over Tucker in the girls’ second race of the day.

Tucker senior Naima Jackson (24:12.39) took the individual honors with Towers freshman Brittani Middlebrooks (26:01.64) in second.

Columbia had the next four runners to finish as sophomore Delisa Grant (26:27.45), junior Denesha Grant (26:52.12), junior Jennecia King (27:19.49) and sophomore Aseneth Williams (27:19.99) crossed in order.