WEST SALEM — The West Salem High School boys cross country team placed second in Division 2 at the WIAA state meet last year.
The Panthers were dominant locally and pushed Kohler at The Ridges Golf Course by placing three of their runners among the top 17 — and all five scorers in the top 40 — at the season’s biggest competition, which included 152 runners.
While three of the top four West Salem performers that day were going to graduate in the spring, there wasn’t a lot of concern about how the Panthers would continue an incredible run of recent success this fall.
Coach Justin Stakston’s program is firmly established with six straight Coulee Conference championships and five consecutive appearances at the state meet.
“I knew we were losing a lot of guys, but I also knew we had a big freshman class last year,” West Salem senior Carson Gronemus said. “I always say the biggest jump for runners is from freshman year to sophoimore year, and these guys put in a lot of miles over the summer.
“I think I knew were going to have a pretty good team again this year.”
The Panthers have run in two invitationals this fall and won them both. West Salem used a team score of 42 to win the Gale Johnson Invitational at Maple Grove Venues on Saturday after winning the Ken Trott Invitational earlier in the week.
Gronemus has been a scoring runner for the Panthers in three state tournaments and takes on a new role as the veteran for a very young team that will take aim at another conference championship and state appearance.
“I’m tryig to push the guys the best I can,” Gronemus said. “It’s hard pushing this guy (he said motioning to Evan Berra) because he’s so good right now, but I want to talk everybody up and keep them going.”
Gronemus said the first couple of meets are about building pacing, gaining experience and finding groups within the team. Running groups within races are important, and the Panthers showed that by keeping four of them in the front pack.
Berra was the one who pulled away to win the race and won it in 16 minutes, 51.1 seconds. Gronemus was second in 17:07.2 and junior teammate Andrew Lorenz third at 17:11.3.
Sophomores Owen McKinney and Landon Rieber will also have large roles in where this team goes if early meets are an indicator, and they will have senior Kaleb Spah and junior Michael Torrance pushing them.
They followed the group philosophy on a familiar course. Both Berra and Gronemus said the challenge of running Maple Grove can be the unleveled ground. The course is mostly flat without many hills, but the ones that are there can create battles for runners.
The Panthers will run on it again during an invitational on Oct. 4 before starting its focus on the postseason. The conference meet is in Black River Falls on Oct. 16, and a Division 1 sectional follows in Menomonie eight days later.
West Salem — the boys team; not the girls — has moved up a division this fall in light of recent success and performance points. The Panthers also placed fourth at the state meet in 2023.
“We’re just trying to run good times and build on those,” said Berra, who also won the Ken Trott this year. “We want to get better each race, so right now we’re just trying to find our starting points.”
