La Mirada High School

Suburban League Cluster Meet #1 (Dyestatcal Link) (Kirby Lee Photos)
La Mirada had close call in first meet (Whittier Daily News Link)

Matadores harriers took to the rolling, grassy hills of La Mirada Regional Park last Thursday in the first of three Suburban League meets. Kicking off the day's action were the junior varsity girls. Leading the way for the Lady Mats were the frosh-soph duo of Amber Hickman and Charlene Ganton. When the scores were tallied, the girls were able to pull out a closely contested contest in 2nd place. After an hour wait, the junior varsity boys took to the hills. Newcomer, Joseph Jeon, and freshman, Paul Rael, led the way this day as the boys walked away with a 4th place finish.

When the time came for the varsity Lady Mats to take the field, there were collective sighs of relief and anticipation from coaches and team members. Realistically, they were aware of the difficulty of the task before them. The Cerritos girls were running well and had beat them in head-to-head competition at the Weisenburger Invite just a week earlier. As a team, they agreed that all they needed to do to stay in the hunt for the league title was finish the day in second place. They knew that neither senior, and last seasons league runner-up Melissa Byrd, nor all-league runner Ashley Casanover were cleared to race. It was clear to them that both Melissa and Ashley were instructed by their health care team to use the "race" as a workout. So, prior to the race, Ashley was instructed to stay back with virus-ridden Aja Labasan, and Byrd was instructed to be a "safety valve," so to speak, in case of a tie. The big question on everybody's mind was, "Would there be enough scoring power to make the race close?" When the gun sounded, a large pack of girls took off together and stayed close for the first half mile. Sophomore, Celinda Manzo, was the first to break away and eventually pulled out to a 30 second lead on the chase pack. Together the Suburban League girls raced until just after mile one when a trio of Cerritos Dons pulled away from the pack with last season's league champion, Lauren McIntyre, in chase. By the time the race reached the halfway point, Cerritos had a clear advantage with a 24 - 32 point lead. By mile 2, Lauren pulled ahead into the 4th spot and Paulina Tapia, racing in only her 2nd varsity race, moved up to the 6th spot, making the score 25 - 30 in favor of Cerritos. We'll never know what was going through the minds of the girls at that point. Perhaps it was the likelihood of losing their first league meet since 2000; perhaps it was the thought of maintaining a tradition; perhaps it was just lots of pain and a little luck. In any case, with 1200 meters left in the race, there was a collective surge from La Mirada's #2 - #6 runners that allowed them to prevail. Paulina moved from the 5th spot up to 3rd; Lauren was passed, but managed to maintain her position; Ashley dragged a struggling Aja past a competitor; and Byrd, knowing she was the 6th scorer, courageously passed Cerritos' #6. When the dust settled, the Lady Mats discovered they narrowly pulled out a 27 - 28 point victory and extended their winning streak to 87 league meets. Celinda Manzo kept the tradition of La Mirada first place finishes, as she led from start to end.

Last season, the Cerritos program won it's second league title in school history; only twice in recent history has Norwalk lost the league title in the Suburban League. Once again, in the end, a few key passes allowed Cerritos to gain the 48-50 edge over Norwalk.  Leading early were the Matadores, who placed Andrew Garza, Regan Garcia, and Michael Palmer in the top six; however, the fourth and fifth scorers finished in the number 24 and 25 spot to push La Mirada back to third place, while much improved John Glenn secured a solid fourth place finish.