Hayley Jackson & Maria Coffin Finish Top 10 For All-American Honors At Foot Locker Nationals!

Girls Results - Boys Results - More Coverage

The largest group of Maryland qualifiers ever for the Foot Locker Nationals produced a pair of All-American finishers with Patuxent senior Hayley Jackson and Annapolis senior Maria Coffin finishing top 10 at Balboa Park against 40 of the best girls cross country runners in the country.

Coffin's All-American finish was somewhat expected with the experience of a running in this meet last year (27th place) and finishing 3rd in a strong Northeast Regional meet, but Jackson finishing as high as she did as the top finisher from the state and 8th in the country was least expected. Both also ran outstanding times on legit and hard 5K course in San Diego as they came across the finish line virtually together with Jackson at 17:49 and Coffin at 17:50. They ended up being the top two finishers for the Northeast Region team as well. 

At one point of the race, only a few seconds could separate Maryland's four girls qualifiers in Jackson, Coffin, Walter Johnson junior Abbey Green, and Catoctin senior Julien Webster. Both Green and Webster would finish with solid showings of 21st place (18:02) for Green and 31st place (18:20) for Webster in their first Foot Locker Nationals appearances. Green will be back next year to attempt to become a 2-time Foot Locker finalist like Coffin achieved.

Jackson and Coffin become only the third and fourth girls from Maryland to earn All-American honors at the Foot Locker Nationals. 1992 national champ Amanda White of Dulaney and 1994 national runner-up Sally Glynn of Walter Johnson had set the benchmark for the state, but since then the rare qualifiers had yet to finish as high as Jackson and Coffin did on Saturday. 

In the boys race, Dalton Hengst of McDonogh School and Will Merritt of Smithsburg competed and represented Maryland as the state's first boys qualifiers since 2009. The 4:10 miler Hengst gave it his best effort for an All-American finish hanging in top 15 and top 20 position for majority of the race, but had to settle for a 21sth place finish in the national class field in a time of 15:37.

Meanwhile, the two-time Maryland 1A state cross country champion Merritt did his best sticking with a field that included many sub 4:10 milers and sub 9:10 two milers on the track as he ran off the back pack throughout the race to finish 33rd place out of 40 in a time of 15:49. Only 5 seconds off from his 5K PR at the Foot Locker Northeast Regional, which nearly race was on a PR friendly course.

A fast year for  the Foot Locker Nationals boys race at Balboa Park's as Hengst's time was only 3 seconds off Matthew Centrowitz's 2006 race performance of 15:34, which earned him an 8th place All-American finish then.