BURLINGTON — It took four years, but the circumstances, and other runners, were finally able to bring Antonio Morales out to run cross country.
If the Burlington-Edison Tigers win a third straight boys’ team title at the state meet Saturday in Pasco, Morales’ arrival will be as big a factor as any.
The Tigers began the year with a solid quartet of juniors — Connor Whan, Tyler Williams, Alan DenAdel and Nathan Power. All but Power ran in the state meet last year.
But the drop-off to the fifth runner (a team’s final scoring participant) was steep, and would make it difficult for the Tigers to match up with the stronger teams in the state, including top rival Sehome.
Enter, albeit a few weeks into the season, Morales. Now a senior, Morales ran track his freshman year and showed good potential in distance events. He also ran cross country in junior high, but never in high school — school, work and family commitments came first. But as senior year rolled around, he didn’t want to miss out on the experience.
“We knew he was out there,” Burlington-Edison coach Sue Wright said. “He had those other commitments, and you can’t argue with that. It’s not like he was going home and playing XBox and not doing anything.”
In the end, it was Whan who convinced his friend to come out.
“He just kept telling me and telling me to do it, that it was fun,” Morales said. “At some point, I just figured it was my senior year, and I’d just kind of try it. He just kind of pulled me in.”
“He’s run really well for us,” Whan said. “He’s been solid all year. He’s a solid third man. We can count on him. We were kind of lacking a fifth.”
Morales showed up with a lot of talent, but was relatively untrained. He hadn’t run competitively in several years, and hadn’t competed at the distance cross country runners cover.
“He doesn’t have the same background in anything, in his endurance or his racing strategies or anything,” Wright said. “We really have to rely on the other guys and just say, ‘Antonio, you’re running with so-and-so until the two-mile mark, and then you can do what you want to do.’ He’s still learning. He’s totally on natural ability.”
It’s been a learn-on-the-fly experience, with help from his teammates. While the others have run in dozens of races, the state meet will be Morales’ eighth — and final — meet.
“If I had done it in past years, I think it would have been better for me,” Morales said. “I would have been faster than I am right now.”
Morales’ emergence certainly hasn’t guaranteed a team title for Burlington-Edison. For the third year in a row, the Tigers have battled back and forth with Sehome. The Mariners are currently the top-ranked Class 2A team.
The Tigers won the state title last year by virtue of their sixth-place runner, who finished ahead of Sehome’s to break a tie. That likely won’t happen this year, as the Mariners have greater depth. If Burlington-Edison is to claim a third straight crown, it will be on the backs of their top five.
Whan and Williams are both in the hunt for an individual state title as well. Both have top 10 times in the state, and both are within a half-minute of the top time — a tough amount of time to make up, but close enough depending on the day and the course.
“Both of us should be able to be top five and, if it’s there, take it,” Whan said. “I’m not going in with that idea. If everyone runs to their potential, we should be able to take the team title.”
Morales kept up with Williams and Whan at the Northwest Conference meet, but typically he, Power and DenAdel have been fairly close in the final three scoring slots.
The Tigers’ top five have little margin for error. The drop-off between the best time of the fifth and sixth place runners is 35 seconds, while Sehome’s top seven are all within a minute of each other and the distance between the best times of the Mariners fifth, sixth and seven runners is just 10 seconds. Sehome can survive an off day by one or two runners, while the Tigers likely can’t.
“We feel pressure, but it’s good pressure,” DenAdel said. “It’s not like we feel like we have to win, but it’s our goal and we’ve been working toward this for a long time. There is some pressure, but we don’t feel obligated to win. It’s more pressure we put on ourselves.”
• Eric Francis can be reached at 360-416-2131 or by e-mail at
