By ALEC ETHEREDGE | Sports Editor 

TRUSSVILLE – A strong cross country season for the Briarwood Christian Lions continued at the Class 5A, Section 3 meet held at Hewitt-Trussville on Friday, Nov. 2, as the girls team took home the section championship and the boys team was able to finish second to send both soaring into the state meet at Oakville Indian Mounds Park on Nov. 10.

The impressive aspect of the girls section win was the youth by which the Lions were led as two eighth graders finished first and second to help bring home the title by a slim five points over John Carroll.

Cady McPhail took home the top prize over teammate Chloe Finocchiaro thanks to a time of 20:54. 23. Finocchiaro finished second with her time of 21:04. 36.

It didn’t take long to find another Briarwood finisher as Adrienne Goolsby was able to claim the fifth spot with a time of 21:34. 99. Lauren Musachia added one more top 10 finisher thanks to her seventh-place finish with a time of 22:10.43.

The Lions had two more finish inside the top 15 as Morgan Harris took 12th and Stella Bell finished in 15th.

Chloe Lovvorn (20th), Madeline Simmerman (22nd) and Anna Ferguson (28th) all finished inside the top 30 to help lead Briarwood to the title.

While Briarwood didn’t win the team title in the boys race, the Lions were able to sweep the individual races thanks to Trent Malloy taking home the title with a time of 17:03.81, which edged out John Carroll’s Jonathan Chestang by 11 seconds.

The Lions got another top five finisher from Joseph Bell, who was able to take fifth with a time of 18:45.02.

Like the girls team, the boys also had some young runners pitch in to help the team to a strong finish.

Eighth grader Patrick Hnizdil and freshman Luke Thompson were both able to finish in the top 20 taking 12th and 17th, respectively. Two older runners, senior Sam Candler and junior Matthew Earnest, also finished inside the top 20 thanks to finishes of 13th and 19th, respectively.

Behind that, Briarwood added one more runner in the top 25, as freshman David Houston took that position on the number with a time of 20:35.16.

Also advancing to the state meet was Shelby County’s Emilie Chapple.

The junior for the Wildcats was able to finish in 14^th with a time of 24:09.26, which was good enough to give her one of the six qualifying spots from the section.