Northwood seniors Eldad Mulugeta and Obsaa Feda have been neck and neck together in virtually all of their races this cross country and now they will have one more race together on the biggest stage. Mulugeta and Feda qualified for next weekend's Nike Cross Nationals on Saturday by being among the top 5 individual finishers (on non-advancing teams) at the NXN Southeast Regional in Cary, North Carolina.
Mulugeta, who often finishes a close second in races to Feda as they went 1-2 in the 4A boys state meet race two weekends ago at Hereford High School, finished fourth overall in the race with a personal best 5K time of 15:15. Feda finished 5 seconds behind his teammate in 8th place with a time of 15:20. Mulugeta was the 1st individual qualifier, while Feda grabbed the 5th and final individual spot for nationals.
In the team standings, Severna Park runners moved up considerably in the last half of the race to finish 4th overall with 238 points and put themselves in at-large consideration, but would also require the 3rd place finishing squad Weddington of North Carolina to be selected as an at-large which is doubtful with 8 other regions also in the mix. Last year was the first year ever that the Southeast Region boys received an at-large squad for their 3rd place team. Severna Park has qualified twice for nationals in past but as one of the top two automatic qualifiers.
The 4A state champions from Severna Park was led by 2017 individual national qualifier Garrison Clark who dealt with injuries at season's end, but was still able to muster a 14th place finish of 15:36 at NXN Southeast. Next finishers for Severna Park were Samuel Martin (34th, 15:53), Nick Benedict (83rd, 16:18), Jake Gelfand (95th, 16:23), and Matthew Bateman (111th, 16:29) to complete their scoring.
Next top Maryland teams in the championship boys race were the 4A state runners-up from Northwood led by their two individual qualifiers in Mulugeta and Feda in 13th place then Dulaney in 19th place (499 pts), Loyola-Blakefield in 20th place (500 pts), and Linganore in 21st place (507 pts).
Beyond Mulugeta, Feda, and Clark, several more Maryland runners dipped under 16 minutes on a muddy and rain soaked course at WakeMed Complex in North Carolina. 3A state cross country champion Michael Belmaggio of Linganore finished 20th with a time of 15:40 and was followed by Calvert's Justin Diehl in 26th place (15:46) and Loyola-Blakefield's Camden Gilmore in 29th place (15:49).