Jefferson High’s boys cross country team made Panther history in Kalispell on Oct 21, bringing the Class B championship title home to Boulder for the first time since 1992.
The Panthers secured the team title with 79 points, comfortably topping second-place Columbus’ 137 and Manhattan’s 148. Senior Luke Mest led the squad with a second-place individual finish, and two of his teammates also landed in the top 15 to All State recognition: senior Logan Hornung finished seventh, while junior Dominic Hurlbert took 11th.
After a season of impressive performances, the Panthers clearly were the team to beat. For their part, they targeted Columbus, their closest rival all season. Sure enough, the Cougars came out the gates hot, their top five runners crossing the mile one mark ahead of the Panthers’ top five. But Head Coach Karson Klass said the boys stuck with their strategy and knew what to do. “That was really fun, to see them pick Columbus off,” Klass recalled. “In the end, our top seven came in before any of Columbus’ top five.”
Mest, who is considering continuing his cross country career at the University of Montana next fall, recalled flopping into the second place chair after finishing, watching the rest of the race play out while too exhausted to move. “I looked up and was struck by just how far ahead we were of everyone,” Mest said. “It was in that moment that I realized, it was probably over – we had probably done it.”
Hurlbert remembered the environment immediately following the race as electric. “I will never forget the build up”, he said, referring to the moments the team spent huddled together, waiting for the final score announcement. “When they called out Columbus as second, everything exploded.”
This had been the vision all season long, Klass said. “Almost immediately, at the end of season awards banquet [in 2022], I started talking with the guys. I said, ‘guys, you have to expect it.’” Klass’s ambition carried throughout the team, pushing each runner toward that first place goal. The training schedule and drive for success was intense to the point of taking over runners’ dreams: senior Dylan Mikesell recalls sophomore teammate Mack Boyd sitting up straight in his hotel bed the night before the state meet, exclaiming he had just hit a personal record, and then falling back asleep.
The road to the top was not without challenges. There were early season injuries, with multiple varsity level runners forced to sit out meets. Family trips had to be rescheduled, and long hours went into running and conditioning. The kicker? A six-month ban on soda pop.
But Klass’s Panthers understood that this dedication was shaping themselves and each other has shaped a cohesive family unit. While cross country is often considered an individual sport, the group believes the relationships and mindset built through spending so much time together is what changed the game.
“It’s long runs with a small group,” Mest explained. “You become close. That’s what makes a cross country victory so much sweeter than anything else — I truly know these people. During track, it’s a big group effort, you’re sharing victory with a bunch of people you might hardly know. But in cross country, it’s us. It really means something.”
“We just couldn’t do it without each other,” senior Christian Gillmore agrees. “Both literally, of course, when it comes to team wins; but also figuratively, we really need and support each other like a family.” Gillmore’s favorite moment of the state weekend came while running side by side with teammate Dylan Mikesell, spotting Columbus just ahead. Mikesell shouted, “I see Columbus!” to which Gillmore replied, “Let’s get ‘em!” as the pair surged forward.
At the last regular season meet in Townsend, Jefferson’s top runners opted to step off (intentionally running at a slower pace )in favor of pacing teammates. “I wanted to lead Mack [Boyd] to his personal best,” Hornung recalls. “It was low pressure — I wasn’t doing it for me, I was doing it for Mack.” Mest ran alongside Mikesell, seeing it as both an opportunity to rest before State and a chance for team building.
Five senior runners will graduate next spring — but they’re not hanging up their spikes just yet. The majority of the team will compete in the spring track season. And there’s one final cross country meet on their radar: For the first time, the Panthers will be competing in the NXR Northwest Regional cross country meet. The boys will travel to Boise to compete in the Nike-sponsored, invitation-only event the weekend of Nov 11, hoping to once again return to Jefferson High with some hardware for the display case.
