Shaler cross country teams look to reach potential at WPIAL championship meet

By: HSSN Staff
Sunday, October 22, 2017 | 11:00 PM

Inexperience won't be an issue for Shaler cross country coach Justin Eskra heading into Thursday's WPIAL Class AAA championship meet.

Everyone running the course will be tackling Cooper's Lake new design. Meet director Tom Norris announced last week the course will be changed for the Oct. 26 meet.

“Throws a wrench into things,” Eskra said. “We got an email saying they were having issues with property owners.”

Longtime Slippery Rock cross country coach John Papa will be in charge of designing the course.

So having boys and girls teams made up of primarily freshmen and sophomores shouldn't be a major problem. What Eskra is trying to work with them on is seeing into the future.

Not being so results-oriented is the push.

“A lot of them being freshmen, they are in a middle-school mindset of every meet is important,” Eskra said. “They are focused on individual performance every single week versus looking at the long term. It's not a bad thing, but they don't understand the training regimen, don't understand why we're doing certain runs certain days of the week.”

Sophomore Dalton Kalbaugh has led the boys team throughout the season. He placed fourth with a time of 19 minutes, 10 seconds at the Montour Challenge, where the Titans finished seventh. Junior Noah Paskowski, senior Max Borza and freshmen Jonathan Zang and Luke Franks rounded out the top five for Shaler.

Freshman Danielle Eshelman has been a consistent force on the girls side. During a sixth-place team finish at the Montour Challenge, she placed third in 23:23. Freshman Lauren Raida, sophomore Bella Piliyh, senior Adeline Kubicsek and freshman Savannah Sahr rounded out the top five.

Eskra is looking to get someone through to states. Team-wise, Eskra doesn't have many defined goals.

“As far as a team goes, we're looking for an improvement on where we placed last year,” Eskra said. “The boys and the girls are consisting of ninth- and 10th-graders. There is a lot of potential on both sides.”

That potential has a perfect stage to flourish at the WPIAL championships.

This year, the field may be more level for newbies than in the past.

“Everything they've done since June has been a build-up for the upcoming week,” Eskra said. “If they are on the starting line, they've been successful this year. Go out and compete, and that's it.”

Josh Rizzo is a freelance writer.

Tags: Shaler