AUGUSTA — Both the boys and girls cross country teams from Mt. Blue High School placed third in Class A at the KVAC Championships at Cony High School in Augusta on Saturday.

Hampden, the top ranked team in the state, won the boys race with highly regarded Brunswick 2nd. Mt. Blue had a 21-point margin over Camden Hills, a team that had beaten the Cougars soundly two weeks earlier, to grab 3rd place out of the 12 schools in Class A.

Cyrus Evans in 5th place and Henril McCourt in 6th each earned first team All-KVAC honors to lead the team. Freshmen Luke Doscinski and Ben Hatch both ran excellent races placing 24th and 26th. The key for the Cougars were the outstanding races of Kodi Quimby and Daniel Dalton in 36th and 38th places, each exceeding their expected finish by over 10 spots. Noah Civiello rounded out the team in 53rd place.

For the girls, the 3rd place finish behind Bangor and Camden Hills was even more unexpected as the Cougars ran without normal #2 runner Lucinda Carroll and Cassidy Hardy had to drop out of the race halfway through due to injury.

However, each of the other five Mt. Blue varsity runners exceeded expectations. Nora McCourt earned All-KVAC first team honors placing 7th, while Natalie McCarthy made the 2nd team with a 12th place finish. The other finishers for the team were Moriah Reusch (20), Elizabeth Strickland (33), and Brielle Tinker (36) as the Cougars edged Brunswick by 8 points for 3rd place.

In seperate JV competition, Andrew Robinson placed 9th in the boy’s race, while Molly Patterson and Addie Colello were 15th and 25th in the girls race.