Story: DGN at Class 3A state meet

After spending last year at Peoria’s Detweiller Park as a spectator because of injury, Downers Grove North sophomore Grace Maletich is determined to become a regular at the Class 3A girls cross country state meet.

”Last season was hard and going into summer training at the beginning, I only wanted to go to state this time,” Maletich said. “I wanted to get here so bad. (Sectionals) was such a good race so it’s just nice to be here, even though it wasn’t a great race. It feels so good just to be here.”

Maletich’s 36th-place finish in her first state race Saturday, Nov. 9, at Detweiller also shows that she’s on her way to becoming one of the state’s best.

Maletich (17:51 for 3.0 miles) was 17 seconds from the last of the 25 all-state spots as the Trojans finished 21st as a team (492 points) after a one-year absence.

Sophomore Kaitlyn Bonfield was 127th (18:48), followed by freshman Emma Moravec (143rd, 18:59), sophomore Angela Budach (156th, 19:07) and seniors Katie Portman (161st, 19:12), Stephanie Urbancik (183rd, 19:49) and Meghan Bonfield (196th, 20:14). State alternates were juniors Jenna Murphy, Zayna Jan and Rachel Krusenoski, sophomore Maci Schaub and freshman Brigid Miller.

”I was hoping for top 25 going into it. It wasn’t a bad race. I wasn’t a good race, but it wasn’t a bad one, either,” Maletich said. “I wanted to do better, but I’m not disappointed in what I got. There were a lot of turns to the season and I did the best I could.”

Meghan Bonfield was the lineup’s only runner with previous state cross country experience, competing with the team as a freshman and sophomore. Maletich and Kaitlyn Bonfield, Meghan’s sister, were the only other varsity regulars from last year’s lineup.

"(State) was an amazing experience,” Portman said. “Cross country has done a lot for me over the past four years and I’m really glad that I got to end it here, even if I didn’t race my absolute best.”

”It was a lot of fun. I’m so glad our team made it,” Urbancik added. “It was a great experience and I’m sure this is something I’ll remember for the rest of my life.”

Maletich, Urbancik and Meghan Bonfield also have competed at the state track meet. In May, Maletich qualified individually in the 1,600-meter run (25th, 5:15.76) after running a qualifying 5:17.50 at sectionals and then joined Urbancik in the finals of the 3,200 relay for all-state, sixth-place finish (9:21.71).

”I’m hoping to have a great track season. I’m super confident and I just want to train super hard and do really well at state,” Maletich said. “I want to do better than I did last year. I want to actually go to finals. After this, just cross country and state, it gives me that much more confidence. It really is an expectation now, I feel like.”

Downers North coach Tim McDonald, also the head track coach, hopes that the mindset of expecting state berths through hard work can continue and grow throughout the program.

”We’ve got to get back to coming down here with a purpose of doing well and kind of something to run for,” McDonald said. “Hopefully, we can get there. Hopefully these four girls coming back can kind of lead the way and get everybody going again.

”You want the sectionals to be in going in where it’s, ‘Let’s have a good race,’ and then come down here (to state) and say, ‘OK. This is what it’s all about. We’re here. This is for all of the marbles,’ instead of kind of where we were where it’s like, ‘Oh man, we just hope we get out of the sectional because we’ve got to beat some teams we haven’t beaten.’ ”

McDonald also hopes the Trojans can build off of their uplifting and inspirational performance at the Hinsdale Central Sectional when the pressure was on big time.

Projected by most to just miss a top-five sectional finish to reach state, the Trojans pulled out the final team berth by five points over Lyons Township, which had beaten them in all four of their previous meetings and hadn’t missed a state team berth since 1998.

”Overall, you probably would say we just didn’t have as good of a team race (at state) as we had (at sectionals),” McDonald said.

“I thought Grace did a nice job. Ideally, you want to be all-state. She’s probably about where she should be. It’s hard when you put so much into the sectionals, where you have to have your perfect race. We ran our best race of the year last week and that got us down here. I’m disappointed for the (state) result but it’s nothing to feel bad about. It’s a different feeling altogether (if we don’t even qualify).”

Had Downers North and LT tied for fifth at sectionals, both teams would have qualified for state. Even if the Trojans ended up sixth, the runners agreed moments after the race that they gave it their best shot.

”This has been a great finish to the season. If it ended last week (at sectionals), I would have been OK with it, but this is so much better,” Moravec said.

If the Trojans did not advance out of sectionals, Maletich and Kaitlyn Bonfield still would have advanced as individual qualifiers.

Maletich was healthy from the start after spending most of 2012 battling a pulled stomach muscle and not competing, including the team’s annual mid-September race at Detweiller. This year, she was a team-best 10th at Detweiller Sept. 21 in the Richard Spring Invitational in 17:44.

An Achilles injury just before this postseason contributed to a couple of subpar races and some concern. Maletich responded with a stellar race at the sectional, taking fifth behind four eventual all-staters, two who finished among the top 10.

”Going into sectionals, I wanted to go to state with the team and just help them get it so I guess that’s what helped me,” Maletich said. “Really, I’ve just been running for the team. It’s hard to do bad, knowing that you disappoint the team and we could have done that much better.”

Kaitlyn Bonfield finally got the first of what should be several state opportunities after a frustrating 2012. At last year’s sectionals, she missed an individual berth in cross country by one place and 1.4 seconds and in track by .27 from the 11:22.04 state-qualifying standard in the 3,200.

Bonfield discovered just how fast the start of the state race can be.

”It helped you push to go out with them and you just had to be ready. I just tried to go with everyone,” Bonfield said. “I want to make it again and improve because this year I didn’t get a (personal record) or anything and I didn’t have my best race. I think it’s a learning experience for everyone and we can just try and improve next year so hopefully we’ll make it again.”

Great improvement by program newcomers and senior veterans combined for a strong lineup.

Portman has been a four-year runner but this was her first time ever competing for the varsity. She nearly was a state alternate last year but opted to focus on her first season as a captain for the speech team.

Again a speech captain, Portman noted that she was missing a tournament at Wheaton North because she was at state, something she never expected but something she didn’t keep herself from accomplishing.

“I never let myself get into my head. I never psyched myself out and that helps a lot,” Portman said. ”I guess I’ve just learned if you don’t in expecting anything to happen, just having an open mind, open stride, you can accomplish anything.”

Urbancik did run at last year’s regionals, just as Murphy did this season in place of Meghan Bonfield, who was taking a college entrance exam.

Urbancik is a track standout who has been a part of three all-state 3,200 relays. She also is hoping she can accomplish more this spring, especially since the top five state finishers in the open 800 were all seniors.

”Depending on what the team looks like, and maybe we’ll have an awesome 4-by-800, I would love to medal individually (top nine) and that’s probably my goal,” Urbancik said. “I think just this cross country season has given me more confidence as a distance runner.”

Budach joined cross country for the first time after competing on the frosh-soph level for track and came on strong after a one-week layoff in midseason due to illness. Her first varsity race happened to be at Detweiller Sept. 21, and she ran 19:05.

”It just helps with knowing the course and knowing that everyone goes really fast. It’s a good place to get your best time so it’s a lot of fun to run here,” Budach said.

”I never expected that I would be going to state. It was a lot of fun. My goal for the year, my top goal I thought, would just to be to make it on varsity. I was really surprised when we got to state. I was so happy. It’s great to run with these great people. We had a lot of fun times.” 

Just before the Richard Spring Invite, Moravec had just been promoted to varsity and got a chance to run varsity at Detweiller with Hannah Thomas, her freshman teammate at Herrick Middle School. Unfortunately, it was the last race for Thomas because of a season-ending injury.

Moravec stopped during the because of stomach cramps that she attributed to an unfamiliar breakfast routine, yet she still ran 19:00. This time, she was prepared, bringing hard-boiled eggs to accompany her bacon, yogurt and cereal.

”This time definitely went better. I brought my own breakfast,” Moravec said. “It was all good.”

Meghan Bonfield was Trojans’ No. 6 state finisher as a freshman (160th, 18:52) and sophomore (110th, 18:37). The 2010 Trojans had high hopes at state but finished 10th (260) after winning sectionals by 54 points. The 2011 team’s journey was similar to this season’s, taking 21st (448) after a fourth-place sectional finish but with 43 points to spare.

”I didn’t have the race I wanted to, but I was still glad to be out here for my last year and have one last shot at being here,” Meghan Bonfield said. “I didn’t really think of it (being my last race) really. At the very beginning, my legs were really sore and I don’t know why but I just couldn’t really move and it was sort of sucky. I didn’t even get to the north pole and I was already really tried and I just felt really slow. It was just kind of a mess.”

The best part of the trip for Bonfield characterized one of the Trojans’ strengths this season – team unity. Since the summer, that was a priority for the four team captains, seniors Micah Pfotenhauer and Sandra Di Pauli and juniors Alyssa Blashill and Lauren Taylor. 

”I think that the team bond was much closer this year than ever before when we were here,” Bonfield said. “I think that’s made it so fun. Maybe we didn’t have the best results we’ve ever had, but I thought it was the best season team wise for us.” 

Bonfield said she especially joined the bus ride to Peoria. Having radio stations that are already are playing non-stop Christmas music only helped.

”We were just singing really loud with the radio and it was really fun and we even started singing Christmas songs, which is fun,” Bonfield said. “A lot of people got mad. I like Christmas songs, and I don’t care if it’s not Christmas yet because I still like them but some people were like, ‘Oh my God,’ but it was fun because everyone was just sort of singing and having a good time.’

-- By Bill Stone