Burroughs High boys, Burbank’s Fernandez find spot in Pacific League winner’s circle

ARCADIA — For quite some time, it seemed as if the Arcadia High cross-country program was unbeatable at its home course of Arcadia County Park.

The Apaches racked up Pacific League team and individual titles, which left locals hoping for second at best.

In what has already proven to be a season of change, the winner’s circle featured a pair of different competitors from Burroughs High and Burbank.

The Burroughs boys’ squad picked up its second league victory this season and first ever in Arcadia, while Bulldogs junior Candela Fernandez won her second straight league meet with the second-best all-time mark in a competition that also provided solid results for Crescenta Valley, Hoover and Glendale on Thursday afternoon.

“We’ve run on some fast courses before, so we were expecting to do well,” Burroughs Coach John Peebles said. “But up until a couple of weeks ago, we had never won a Pacific League race, so expectations certainly changed.”

Burroughs showed its strength and versatility in knocking off defending league champion Arcadia for a second straight meet, this time by a score of 20-38.

While Arcadia’s Phillip Rocha won the race in 14 minutes, 31.56 seconds, the Media City squad impressively took the next five scoring positions led by senior Garrett Boulais, who was the race runner-up in a time of 14:38.69.

“We’ve all been working hard and we know this is a fast, fast course,” said Boulais, who obliterated his course personal-best time of 16:31. “We knew it was going to be difficult, but it was exciting.”

Following Boulais were teammates Elias Hoxie (14:51.97), Andrew Barrondo (14:57.69), Shane Thompson (14:58.15) and Alexander Hirsch (15:01.03) in positions third through sixth.

Even though the victory wasn’t surprising given that Burroughs defeated Arcadia, 20-35, at the league’s first meet at Crescenta Valley Park on Sept. 25, Boulais’ effort did raise a few eyebrows.

The Burroughs leader was within a second of Rocha for the first mile and a half before losing some steam and ultimately finishing second.

“That guy is so fast, I just wanted to see how long I could stay with him,” Boulais said of Rocha.

Crescenta Valley finished third with respectable defeats to Burroughs (15-45) and Arcadia (22-35) while picking up sizable wins over the rest of the field.

Manav Vats led the Falcons by placing seventh in 15:03.28, as Crescenta Valley had three additional runners in the top 20 in Colin FitzGerald (12th, 15:23.18), Armin Cardenas-Nuno (14th, 15:29.03) and Kyle Dickinson (20th, 15:43.15).

Senior Enrique Vizcaino paced fourth-place Burbank by taking eighth in 15:06.28 and was joined in the top 20 by fellow Bulldogs Adam Navar (15th, 15:30.91) and Tanner Payne (19th, 15:39.96).

Glendale finished fifth in the competition with victories over archrival Hoover (18-45) and Pasadena (24-35) and was led by Paulo Vazquez (16th, 15:31.68). Vladimir Climasevschii (33rd, 16:51.15) paced Hoover.

On the girls’ side, Fernandez’ only competition graduated four years prior, as the Bulldogs junior ran away to a victory in 16:37.09, which was the second-best time ever run at Arcadia County Park and trailed only the mark of 16:25, set by Arcadia’s Catrina McAlister in 2010.

“I was going for the record, so I’m a little sad I didn’t get it,” said Fernandez, who established a 20-second lead by the half-mile marker. “But it’s always fun running here. It’s a fast course and I’ll get another try.”

Fernandez was so fast that she topped 18 runners in the boys’ varsity race and established a 32-second advantage midway through her event.

Ultimately for the Bulldogs, they finished runner-up to Arcadia, which defeated Burbank and Crescenta Valley by identical scores of 21-38.

Burbank, though, took second overall as it bested third-place Crescenta Valley in the head-to-head matchup, 27-28.

The Bulldogs placed three additional runners in the top 20 in Kira Bochard (ninth, 18:09.66), Caroline Adams (11th, 18:12.66) and Alexia Hatun (18th, 18:50.78).

As for the Falcons, they received a strong effort from individual runner-up Megan Melnyk, who finished in 17:34.41.

“It was nice to come out and compete and have some nice weather, that really helped,” Melnyk said. “I didn’t run my best time here, but we’re running better as a team.”

Haley Witzeman was back in action after a suffering a foot injury and was seventh (18:00.56) overall for the Falcons, whose scoring squad all placed in the top 20 in Rebecca Mencia (13th, 18:20.12), Annie Myers (19th, 18:57.44) and Elizabeth Hart (20th, 18:59).

Burroughs took fourth overall and received a strong effort from eighth-place Emily Virtue (18:02.50), one of two team competitors in the top 20 along with Heidi Eligio (12th, 18:14).

Senior Leana Setian was fifth-place Glendale’s top runner, finishing 14th in 18:26.44, while senior Megan Mirkhanian (17th, 18:43) led sixth-place Hoover.