Tanager cross country only has 2 home races

Tanager cross country only has 2 home races By Parker Knox
Sports Writer Vermillion High School cross country runners have only two chances all season to run in front of hometown fans, and the first occurs Saturday. The Tanagers will run along with dozens of high school, college and university athletes in the various events of USDâ�?�?s Don Baker Invitational Saturday morning on the Baker course at the north end of the university campus. In their season-opening meet, the Beresford Invitational last Friday, the Tanager boys placed seventh and the girls squad placed fourth among 20 schools that joined them there for what Coach Kelli Fischbach called a very competitive meet. The individual highlight for Vermillion was Blair Gilkysonâ�?�?s ninth-place finish in the girlsâ�?�? varsity 4,000-meter race in a time of 17:22.�?  What was most promising to her coach was that Gilkyson defeated every other runner from within Vermillionâ�?�?s Region 4A except for one. Elk Point-Jeffersonâ�?�?s region-favorite team won the girls team title at Beresford while Hills-Beaver Creek/Ellsworth captured the boysâ�?�? championship.�? Vermillion, which has an 11-girl roster this fall, had 79 points in the girlsâ�?�? division. The boysâ�?�? team, which has 15 boys out for the sport although three are also playing football and another is playing soccer, had 115 team points.�? Of the eight men who ran the varsity race at Beresford, they had a total of varsity races in their career histories, so the seventh-place team finish was quite respectable.