By Cort Reynolds

COLUMBUS GROVE - The Ada cross country teams competed at the 38th annual Columbus Grove Invitational last Saturday morning.

"We had a great meet," said Ada head coach Joshua Klein. "All of our boys and girls ran their fastest times of the season, some improving by several minutes."

The Bulldog boys finished 21st out of 24 teams with 26 schools represented. Sophomore Reece Evans finished in a team-best time of 19:01 over the 3.1-mile course.

Bulldog Michael Crouse nosed out teammate Hunter Wells racing for the finish line as the duo came in only six-tenths of a second apart with a shared time of 20:04.

Bulldog Jacob Morgan ran a 21:42, and Ian Dellifield finished in 26:20.

Ottoville's Brandon Siefker won the boys individual title in a time of 15:34.17. Minster captured the boys small school division team title with 56 points, followed by Lincolnview (122).

The Ada girls placed 13th out of 13 teams, with 26 schools in all represented. Grove won the girls small school title with 37 points, with Lincolnview a distant second (110).

Alyssa Ellerbrock of CG won the girls individual race in a time of 19:00.29.

Courtney "Coco" McLaughlin finished her race in a time of 24:53 to pace the Ada girls. Alexis Ennis was second for the Lady Bulldogs in 26:02.

Coming in third for Ada was Nora Dellifield at 27:52, followed by Paige Cole at 28:02 and Dani Waugh in 30:13.  

"We are continuing to overcome running pains, and I hope to have everyone running in two weeks," said Klein. "We will have a small group this week due to the county fair.

"I am proud of this team, and excited to see how we continue to improve throughout the remaining weeks," he added. "We trained hard this week, and will continue to do so in order to improve our times."

Ada runs next on Saturday morning, Sept. 9 at the Spencerville Invite.