Metro Atlanta programs River Ridge and Sequoyah captured the team titles Saturday at the Heritage 5-Star Stride in Ringgold.
The fifth annual meet hosted by Heritage High School served as the opener of this year's North Georgia Cross Country League schedule.
Woodstock's River Ridge was the boys' winner with a team total of 86 points, placing three runners in the top 10. Canton's Sequoyah was second with 88 points, followed by Marietta (94). Coahulla Creek (134) was fourth, and the Colts' Lane Hollis was the individual champion with a time of 16 minutes, 43 seconds in the 5K.
Dalton finished sixth, led by 19th-place Victor Soria, while Ooltewah was seventh, paced by seventh-place finisher Chance Underwood. Southeast Whitfield was eighth, Heritage ninth with Gavin Chandler eighth overall and Notre Dame 10th with Colton Sanborn fifth overall.
Sequoyah had four runners in the top 20 to edge River Ridge on the girls' side, 63-65. Dalton was third at 69, with fifth-place finisher Giselle Dominquez (21:52) leading the way for the Lady Catamounts.
Heritage was sixth, led by Allison Craft in eighth place, followed by Boyd Buchanan and Coahulla Creek - the Lady Colts' Kaylee Bandy was third - Ringgold and Ooltewah.
* Chattanooga Christian School senior Jack Cottrell ran a 16:09.42 in his debut 5k of the season Saturday at the Midtown Invitational. Cottrell's time ranks second on the state leaderboard so far this season. CCS had four of the top five runners at the meet hosted by Brainerd, with junior Carson Turner finishing second as the Chargers won the team title, followed by the Chattanooga Patriots and East Ridge.
* At Baylor, the Lady Red Raiders edged Signal Mountain 25-32 in a two-mile dual meet. Helen Webb posted the best time at 12:30, with teammate Mae Mae Powe finishing second at 12:36. Ellie Myers, Rosa Anderson and Addison Johnson rounded out Baylor's scorers, while Kelsey Thompson led Signal Mountain with a third-place finish at 13:29, and Sophia Gibby, Hannah Laramore, Gracen Glover and Charlotte Harrison also scored for the Lady Eagles.
In the boys' race, the Red Raiders beat 2019 Class A state champion Signal Mountain behind a 1-2 overall finish from Xian Campbell and William Hamm. Campbell (10:23) and Hamm (11:07) were joined by Jack Gartman (11:14), Garrison Corley (11:17) and Alex Coley (11:18) in scoring for Baylor, which won with 18 points to Signal Mountain's 37. Joshua Pote (11:09) led the Eagles at third overall, with Colton Underwood (11:21), Kaid Boehm (11:36), Max Sewell (11:43) and Mason Howell (12:10) also scoring.
FOOTBALL
Signal Mountain 28, Hixson 0: Eagles quarterback Duncan Cannon threw two touchdown passes, both to Andrew Eichner, in the nonregion win Saturday evening. The game was postponed from Friday due to the threat of inclement weather. Braden Casner added a 4-yard touchdown run for Signal Mountain (1-1), and Chance Townson returned an interception for a score. Hixson is 0-2.
SOFTBALL
At Allatoona's tournament, Ridgeland, noted for late-inning victories so far this season, won a pair of games featuring thrilling endings on Friday.
The Lady Panthers defeated Villa Rica 7-6 with two runs in the seventh inning after Villa Rica had scored three times in the top half. Cordasia Watkins had two hits and two RBIs, Maggie Dickson three hits and Makayla Cope and Maddie O'Toole drove in two runs each for the winners. Ridgeland won the second game 9-8 over East Paulding with three runs in the final inning, with Watkins driving in five runs on three hits.
Ridgeland's run of late-inning dramatics ran out Saturday, though, with a pair of 9-1 losses to Sequoyah and Mount Paran Christian.
Calhoun dropped all four of its games at the tournament, three of them against Class AAAAAAA teams. The Class AAAAA Lady Yellow Jackets lost 12-1 to Locust Grove, then fell 11-9 to Harrison on a two-run walkoff home run in the seventh. They fell 5-1 to Lowndes and 5-0 to North Gwinnett on Saturday to drop to 4-6 this season.
VOLLEYBALL
CCS 3, Signal Mountain 0: Emily Day led Friday's sweep with 27 assists and nine digs, with A.J. Johnson posting 13 kills and 10 digs, Lauren Kay 14 digs, Avery Ray six kills, Kayla Youell four kills and seven digs and Kennedy Barber five kills.
Contact Lindsey Young at lyoung@timesfreepress.com. Follow him on Twitter @youngsports22.