As the middle two kids in a family of runners, Matt and Brianna Newell have been running from a time not long after they were able to walk.
The pair have won plenty of races along the way, but Saturday morning, they may have captured their biggest ones yet, and less than an hour apart. Matt won the boys race, and Brianna took the girls race to lead Columbus North to team titles in its own regional at Ceraland.
Matt Newell, a sophomore, ran a personal-best 15 minutes, 36.8 seconds for 5,000 meters (3.1 miles) to finish about six seconds ahead of runner-up Carter Leak of Jennings County.
“It’s a PR, but I was hoping for a little bit quicker time,” Matt Newell said. “In the beginning, I tried breaking Carter Leak with a fast first mile at 4:50, but he ended up sticking on. It was tough. I thought he would break, but he didn’t.”
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Brianna Newell, a freshman, had a little closer race. She ran stride for stride with teammate Mackenzie Barnett the entire race, and the pair crossed the finish line at the same time after a sprint to the finish. Brianna Newell was awarded the win in 18:50.5 to 18:50.6 for Barnett.
“I didn’t really care if I won or didn’t because I knew that we’d be right together,” Brianna Newell said.
The third-ranked Bull Dog girls finished with 20 points to 88 for runner-up Seymour. The top five teams qualified for Saturday’s Brown County Semistate.
North’s Aric Tong finished fifth in 19:31.8. Jessica Meza took seventh in 19:40.4, while Ellen White was ninth (19:50.1), Abigail Jacobi 12th (20:06.7) and Kennedy Kerber 19th (20:38.7).
“I think we did what we were supposed to do for the most part — just run together and pace it and not worry about our time so much,” Barnett said.
North coach Rick Sluder rested his No. 3 and 4 runners, Olivia Morlok and Lily Baker.
“Our girls ran great, especially Bri and Mac in front,” Sluder said. “They kind of ran together on purpose and did a fantastic job. Really, all seven ran strong today. They had a mission to go out and win on their home course.”
Jennings County took fourth with 114 points, and Columbus East claimed the fifth-and-final team qualifying spot with 125.
Emma Morrison finished fourth in 19:23.8 to lead the Panthers. Halle Franks took 22nd in 21:05.8, while Liz Wahlman was 27th (21:14.5), Heather Sea 29th (21:18.7) and Rilee Hicks 69th (23:56.4).
“It’s been a goal (to make it to semistate), but we know what to do during tournament time,” Jennings girls coach Leah McLeod said. “Emma is really looking strong. She knows what she wants. She wants to make it to state, and then our 2-through-4 with Halle, Elizabeth and Heather all ran PRs today.”
Chloe Krueger led the Olympians with a 14th-place finish in 20:22.1. Laurel Knight took 20th in 20:57.1, while Olivia Shoaf was 33rd (21:29.7), Olivia Linnemann 42nd (21:47.7) and Jordan Spurgeon 48th (22:11.6).
“(Making semistate has) been the goal of ours all season,” East girls coach Jesse Shoaf said. “We had a good race. Our top three really have been consistent all season, and we had a really good race out of Jordan Spurgeon today, and that was the difference.”
Brown County also had qualified for regional as a team, but has had only five runners for most of the season and was missing one on Saturday. Hadley Gradolf finished third in 19:13.1, and Emelia Koester took 18th in 20:29.5 to advance to semistate as individuals. Maris Wyman was 47th in 22:07.0, and Emma DeBord finished 75th in 25:03.7.
Meanwhile, the ninth-ranked North boys scored 25 points to 50 for runner-up and No. 25 Jennings.
Reese Kilbarger-Stumpff finished third in 15:48.2 to lead the Bull Dogs. Andy Stohr took fourth in 15:53.3, while Austin Pulkowski was eighth (16:12.3), Collin Pruitt ninth (16:12.6), Evan Carr 11th (16:15.3) and Will Kiel 15th (16:34.4).
“We seized the opportunity to run fast,” North boys coach Danny Fisher said. “It was perfect conditions. It’s cool, and the course is rock-hard and it’s fast. As long as the boys came in prepared mentally and physically, they knew they were going to run fast. We wanted to be a little more aggressive today and kind of prepare for next week for the rematch with Bloomington South at semistate.”
Leak finished in a school-record 15:42.4 to lead the Panthers. Lane Elsner and Gavin Hendrix took sixth and seventh in 16:04.3 and 16:08.3, while Drew Stroud was 17th (16:42.1) and AJ Siener 21st (16:46.3)/
“We knew it would be a tall task to beat North with them being fresh after sitting some of their guys last week and us coming off a couple of tough back-to-back weeks of races,” Jennings boys coach Bryant Layman said. “So we kind of figured we were a second-place team today, and we ran like a second-place team. The good news is, the pressure is on everyone else for semistate, and we actually feel like we have the momentum, so everything is kind of going to plan for us.”
Brown County’s boys finished eighth with 194 points, and Columbus East took ninth with 223, with each of those teams advancing one individual to semistate. The Eagles’ Chase Austin finished 13th in 16:15.5, and the Olympians’ Nick Walter was 22nd in 16:47.0.
Hauser’s Ryan Ault also qualified as an individual with an 18th-place finish in 16:44.5.
Also scoring for Brown County, Rafe Silbaugh took 38th in 17:32.5, while Cameron Fox was 49th (17:48.6), Waylon Patrick 59th (18:12.2) and Blake Wagler 74th (18:47.5).
East’s Colby Hertle finished 46th in 17:44.6, while Casey Bartholomew was 65th (18:29.2), Ryan Sadtler 69th (18:37.5) and Kaleb Walters 71st (18:39.6).
