Brentwood Lia Banovac opened her sophomore campaign on a high note placing third overall, breaking 19:00 for the first time, and leading the Bruins to a Saturday Light Fever team title.
Saturday Light Fever
The ground will be firm, the at race temperature will be in the low seventies, and the teams attending will be some of the strongest in Tennessee. Unlike last year, this weekend's competition will span two evenings with the middle school races occurring on Friday night and the High School races, condensed to one division, will occur on Saturday. A welcome change from 2023 which saw significant delays due to traffic volume in and out of Sanders Ferry. MileSplit Tennessee will be there covering both nights and here's what we'll be looking for.
- Though the season is young, two runners will be lining up on Friday Night with some of the fastest 2-Mile times in the state so far for Middle Schoolers. Knox Doss' Jackson Oliver sits atop the boys rankings currently with an 11:02 and West Collierville's Maya Lang ranks 3rd for girls with a 12:18. Both enter the race undefeated each with two wins.
Middle School Rankings: Boys | Girls
- Father Ryan's Lydia Brunner has not raced on the course or on the track since her unexpected state championship in Division II Class AA last November. Will be curious to see how she eases back into racing after the long absence. She placed 16th here last year with a 19:33. Ended the year with a 17:52 at this same course.
- The High School girls race is loaded. It will essentially feature eleven of the Top 15 programs that received a vote in our Preseason Rankings with representation from every corner of the state. Collierville, Science Hill, and Hardin Valley will all make the trip to Middle Tennessee to take on the likes of Brentwood, Page, and Beech setting up a preview essentially of Class AAA.
- The boys side will feature the Preseason #1 and #2 overall teams Knoxville Catholic and Brentwood High School so that will be an interesting team race to monitor. Neither team is coming off of a state championship season from the year before so they're a little unproven but Saturday will be an opportunity to make a statement. A team I have my eye on outside of the rankings however is Central Magnet. Signal is still strong but graduated their top two from last year's squad and the Tigers had a strong showing at Siegel last weekend. I'll be interested in comparing how they race Saturday to the returner times of the Eagles last November.
Preseason Team Rankings: Boys | Girls
- On the topic of Knoxville Catholic, for as much press as Keegan Smith has generated over his career, I personally have only seen him race 1 time at a non-state meet and that was his first race in 2021 as a freshman at Cherokee. So it's been a while. Similarly, I've NEVER seen Radek Molchan race in the regular season at all. Both of these runners lead their respective classes entering the season and have practically every year of their career. So while I anticipate they will pace each other at the front, I'll be curious to see which challengers go with them. There's a lot of talent in the field, take a look at the entries below.