New Philadelphia cross country earns top ranking

Cross Country

With the Ohio High School Athletic Association adding a fourth division this year, things were potentially going to get pretty interesting for New Philadelphia’s boys team. The first official sign of that came Aug. 25, when the Quakers were a unanimous No. 1 in the first edition of the Ohio Track and Cross Country Coaches poll.

New Philadelphia got all 12 first-place votes to total 288 points. Ohio Cardinal Conference rival Lexington was nearly a unanimous second with 274. 

The Quakers’ ranking was no doubt bolstered by their win at the Pickerington North Invitational to start off the year. Their depth was on display this past weekend at the Ashland Invite, which they finished 25th in despite running without several of their top athletes.

At Ashland, junior Branson Pringle, who was among the top seven at Pickerington, led the way for the Quakers with a 39th-place finish, finishing in 17.47.7. Junior Austin Pringle was next, coming in 114th in 19:12.8. 

Others getting some big-meet experience for New Philadelphia included sophomore Brody Stanley (158th place), junior Max Malloy (159th), freshman Luke Rotunno (162nd), junior Jacob Hearn (183rd), senior Brennen Hostetler (187th) and freshman Liam Beamish (303rd). There was a total of 304 runners in the big-school portion of the competition.

In the girls race, the Quakers were ninth among 24 total teams. They were paced by a 12th-place finish from junior Kyle Smith, who crossed in 19:52. Freshman Angel Kauman was next in 21:07.7, which was good for 35th place. Another ninth grader, Katelyn Beaber, finished 51st in 21:44.5, while senior Katlyn Doughty (65th) and juniors Devlin Herrington (87th) finished out the Quakers’ scoring finishers. They were among 224 finishers from larger schools.

Soccer

The Quaker boys fell to 0-3-1 on the young season after falling 3-0 to Ashland in a home Ohio Cardinal Conference match. Rival Dover was awaiting New Philadelphia Sept. 2 with Lexington set to host the Quakers Sept. 6. The season has been a struggle early on for the girls squad, which took a four-match losing streak, three of them shutouts, into the week after felling 3-0 to John Glenn Aug. 26 and 8-0 at Ashland Aug. 30.  

Volleyball

The Quakers had a bit of a rough week, dropping four consecutive matches, including two in the OCC, to move to 1-6 overall. Coming off their first victory of the season, a 3-0 triumph against Mansfield Senior Aug. 23, the Quakers fell 3-1 to first-place Wooster, 3-0 to Lexington, and then 2-0 each to Western Reserve Academy and Hiland in a tri-meet at Berlin.

The highlight of the week was New Philadelphia’s home match against Wooster, which was fairly tight throughout. The Quakers dropped the first set 25-20 before struggling a bit more in 25-14 second set. They bounced back in the third to win 25-22 before falling in the decisive fourth by the same score. Junior Eberle Baker led New Philadelphia with 13 kills. She also had a pair of aces. Senior Aubrie Watson paced the Quakers with 12 digs and three aces. Senior Melissa Loaded was tops with 20 assists and 30 serve receptions.