Pella XC Girls Seeking to Build Dynasty in Chase for Back-to-Back Titles
The Dutch enter the 2023 state meet as heavy--if not overwhelming, favorites to claim at least one top trophy at Lakeside Golf Course
Perspective is a funny thing some times. A year ago, the Pella girls cross country team was returning to the state meet after missing out on the festivities in the 2021 season. They traveled to Lakeside Golf Course this past October as slight favorites in a field with some of the greatest distance runners in Iowa High School History shoulder-to-shoulder at the start line. Their ultimate triumph was so special because it was the first — Coach Doug Cutler and staff have come oh-so-close several times to an elusive state title, and the 2022 team was the right group to finally get them over a long-awaited hurdle.
Now, it doesn’t feel like “if” — it seems like it was the start of a dynasty. The wire-to-wire #1 in 3A Pella girls have dominated every same-sized school this fall, and narrowly came close to upsetting some Class 4A title contenders along the way to what as seems to be an inevitable push to the top of the mountain. That’s not to take away the difficulty it requires to get to this point — what seems so remarkable about this bunch of Dutch is that they are faster, stronger, and frankly, better than they were a year ago. A mix of newcomers has also bumped some of the best seniors this program has ever seen out of the varsity mix and made Pella an overwhelming favorite to claim gold again in 2023.
There are still a few big questions to answer in this Class 3A meet, and there will be a few teams looming to make what would, by all accounts, be a historic upset.
While the team trophy seems to already have a shipping label set for Pella High School, the individual race may be a bit more challenging, but fascinating, with Paityn Noe no longer hovering over the rest of the field. Sophomore Marissa Ferebee dealt with multiple, nagging injuries over the first month of the season, but enters the state meet as the top ranked runner in 3A — a title she started the season with, and now, opportunity awaits the star to see if she can shine again at Fort Dodge and give a historic haul of hardware to the green and white.
Coach Cutler’s Comments About the Girls Race
“There’s some great competition out there — Gilbert is an outstanding team, Mount Vernon-Lisbon, Solon, Ballard, Glenwood had a great state qualifying meet, so we know there’s a lot of really good teams out there. But we know who we are, we know what we can do, I would be a fool to not to agree that we are probably the heavy favorites at this point, I mean, we have seven girls who could all break 20 minutes potentially on that state course. That would be a phenomenal thing to happen; that doesn’t need to happen, we don’t need to try and do something extraordinary, necessarily. What I believe is that if we continue to run the way we’ve been running, continue to trust that we are getting better and faster and that we can maintain certain speeds at certain points in the race, I think something extraordinary could happen. But it doesn’t need to be done by doing something outside of who we are.”
Let’s break down the field of Class 3A teams heading into the state meet (rankings are the final heading into Lakeside):
Pella - ranked 1st
There’s not much else to add about my thoughts and that of the vast majority of coaches, experts, and others heading into the state meet. It would be an absolute shock if Pella did not win the Class 3A team trophy. The final margin could be insanely impressive as well, with an outside possibility that the Dutch find four runners inside of the top 15 and all seven in the top 40. Marissa Ferebee will be the slight, if not higher, favorite for individual gold after defeating previous #1 Lindsey Sonderman of Harlan and #2 Avery Rump of Fort Madison by nearly 30 seconds at the Pella Sports Park last week. Let’s not forget Ruth Dunham (ranked 5th) also edged those two runners out. Autumn Blink (ranked 15th) has had one of, if not the best, senior seasons in program history, and is chasing her first All-State bid after staying in the top 15 of the rankings for most of the season. Raegan Snieder enters the state meet healthy compared to her dramatic return last fall, and was an All-State runner as a freshman two years ago. The depth of the Dutch makes them so dangerous, as Macy Schroeder, Elsie Brenneman, and Lizzie Neumann have all occupied spots in the top 30 rankings at some point this year, and all could break the 20 minute 5K mark at Fort Dodge. If Pella has their best day, the margin of victory could be one of the biggest ever recorded at the state meet.
Gilbert - ranked 2nd
The Tigers are running fairly well after impressive performance to win the always-deep Raccoon River Conference and a district championship. And with all respect necessary given to the work they’ve accomplished, they are a longshot to compete with the Dutch. That doesn’t mean “impossible,” but a lot would have to go wrong for Pella and a lot would have to be near perfection for Gilbert to make a remarkable upset happen. However, let’s also not understate how good this team is and how a 2nd place finish could set them up as a primary contender back-and-forth with the Tulip City harriers in the coming years. Freshman Emme Dani might be among a handful of runners to challenge for the individual title, moving up to 4th place in the final batch of individual rankings. Dani won the district title at Spencer (19:03.39) and the conference title (19:30.1) at Ballard. A mix of sophomore Keira Anderson (4th at districts), senior Clare Stahr (4th at conference), freshman Callie Hales, junior Abby Patel, and sophomore Maggie Danielson has the Tigers a favorite to place runner-up among the teams, and frankly, this weekend should set up them as the primary challenger of a potential Dutch dynasty in the coming seasons.
Mount Vernon-Lisbon - ranked 3rd
A year after narrowly missing the trophy stand, the Mustangs enter this race in 2023 as a favorite to compete for hardware. Losing Lourdes Mason hurt, no doubt, but don’t look now, this team will be contending again. Ironically enough, MVL lost a trophy to conference foes Solon by just one point. The Mustangs travel to Fort Dodge as a slight favorite after winning the WaMaC conference and their state qualifying site against their Spartan rivals. A strong pack led by Kiersten Swart (19:43, 5th at district site), Evelyn Moeller (19:52.6, 7th at district), Emrie Johnson (19:55.9, 9th at District), and Eastin Whisner (19:58.3, 11th at district) will make them a trophy contender both this year and next, with that core four returning. They have a slight edge in what should be another tight race for the final spot on the team podium.
Solon - ranked 4th
Who needs to rebuild? Solon seems to constantly reload despite some tremendous talent graduating. The 2021 state champions fell short of repeating in a tougher field in 2022, but Sparty has charged themselves into another trophy discussion, especially with a strong second half of the season. Solon narrowly lost their state qualifying meet to Mount Vernon-Lisbon, but had a strong performance in the process. Led by junior Sydney Dee (19:33, 4th at districts), Solon will hope that a slightly deeper field can give them an edge to get into the top three. However, their conference rival Mustangs have gotten them by nearly identical margins at both conference and state qualifying competitions. But Solon makes Fort Dodge a destination each fall, and they will likely put together another strong Saturday to end another fine season.
Ballard - ranked 5th
Life after Paityn Noe has been quite alright for the Bombers. A few years removed from their own dynasty run and having the greatest of all time on their roster the past four seasons was always going to be hard to replace — and Ballard has put together a really solid season in the shadow of a lot of history. The Bombers were runner-up to a deep Gilbert team at the Raccoon River Conference championships and were edged by a surging Glenwood team at the Winterset qualifying site last week. Ballard’s Ava Vance (2nd at the state qualifier) will look for another All-State appearance for the program in her senior campaign, and aim to find a measure of revenge against the Rams in the battle for a 3rd place trophy. State meet veterans Brynn Wilson and Annika Larson (11th in 2022) will look for strong finishes to their season as well. Considering all they lost with Noe last year, the Bombers are a team to watch for the 3rd place trophy.
Glenwood - ranked 6th
The Rams have an outside shot at the 3rd place race, especially with an individual contending for a title. If anyone is going to stop Marissa Ferebee at the state meet, it might just be freshman sensation Grace Berglund. The #2 rated runner heading into Fort Dodge dominated the Hawkeye 10 Conference (without Lindsey Sonderman of Harlan, mind you) with a time of 18:54.36, and followed that up with a 19 second victory over Avelyn Vance of Ballard at the district meet (19:25.9). The challenge for the Rams will be can their trailing pack keep pace with what should be a very deep middle of the field at Lakeside. Glenwood may be a bit shafted by their 6th place ranking after defeating No. 5 Ballard head-to-head, and that motivation could be a difference in what should be a less-than-20 point margin from 3rd to 6th at the state meet. Keep an eye on the veteran duo of Lauren Hughes (7th at district) and Breckyn Peterson (8th at district) to see how far up this western Iowa team can move up in the standings.
Clear Lake - ranked 7th
This northern Iowa squad have found solid footing in the Class 3A race, placing 7th at state last year. Nearly all of those contributors are back, but the question will be can they improve on their 2022 performance in Fort Dodge. The Lions had a competitive district site at their home course, winning by 12 over Decorah and 26 over a slightly-injured ADM team. Clear Lake’s Addison Doughan won the meet individually, and has improved to 3rd in the individual rankings. Frequent Fort Dodge flier Anna Feurerbach is 17th among 3A runners as well. While that duo can be formidable, there was nearly a 50 second gap between the top two and the next runner in the lineup, and even some more distance behind that. That trailing group will need to tighten the time gap or face a possible repeat 7th place performance.
Sioux Center - ranked 8th
A newcomer to the state meet field, at least based on last year’s standings and a multiple year absence, the Warriors present a relative unknown has to how they can perform at Lakeside Golf Course. So often in 3A cross country, the noise at the top is largely handled in central and eastern Iowa. This northwest quadrant squad is aiming to prove that the distance runners of that area are improving. Sioux Center got a taste of that central Iowa feel when they went head-to-head with #2 Gilbert at the district meet last week, and scored 77 points — 30 behind the state qualifying champions and presumed runner-up Saturday. Audrina Jones placed 2nd in that race (19:25.62) and enters the state meet as a potential All-State athlete. It feels as if coming into the meet that there are three tiers in Class 3A this state meet — Pella, the next six teams, and then the rest of the field. The Warriors will aim to prove that formula wrong, but the seven ahead of them coming in are stout.
Decorah - ranked 9th
It’s been a while since the Vikings were the team to beat in Class 3A each year the state meet, with four championships won between the 2012 and 2016 seasons. After missing the 2022 meet, this northeast Iowa squad is back at Fort Dodge and aiming to find themselves in the top half of the standings. Decorah was a narrow runner-up to Clear Lake at that state qualifying site, and sophomore Amelia Roe leads the way for the Vikings, as her 19:32 time was good for 2nd at that site. The Northeast Iowa Conference champions will have a tough time in their return trip to Lakeside if they can’t solve a considerable gap between Roe and the rest of the team. If freshmen Brinlee Courtney (15th at district) and Olivia Volkmann (19th at district) can find their footing at the final race of the calendar, Decorah will stand a better chance at finding a top eight spot.
Harlan - ranked 10th
This bunch of Cyclones left the Pella Sports Park escaping arguably the deepest field of potential state qualifying teams to find a spot in Fort Dodge, and their hoping that test can prepare them for a tough race this weekend. Harlan edged Clear Creek Amana for 2nd at the local site — let’s face it, that wasn’t super close (71 points behind the Dutch), but did survive last year’s 6th place team Washington and up-and-coming Fort Madison to earn a well-earned bid to the dance. The real intrigue is how Lindsey Sonderman, the 2nd fastest returning 3A runner from the 2022 season and the #1 ranked athlete in 3A for most of this fall, responds to her nearly 30 second loss to Marissa Ferebee and to the narrow victory by Ruth Dunham of Pella. If she can regain her confidence, she’s still a contender for individual glory. However, with no other runners breaking the 20 minute barrier at the speedy Dutch course, it will be difficult for the Cyclones to battle for a top 10 spot if they can’t find a bit more speed heading into Lakeside.
The rest of the field (based on IATC rankings):
11. Marion
12. Clear Creek-Amana
13. Lewis Central
14. ADM, Adel
15. Bishop Heelan, Sioux City
The 2023 Class 3A state girls meet will be held at the Lakeside Golf Course in Fort Dodge. I’ll be there for KNIA/KRLS, providing updates, taking photos, and making some fun memories with a tremendous group of kids from the Tulip City. Check out the boys preview Thursday.