New twist on the trails for Deerfield-Windsor, Westover

Although Deerfield-Windsor and Westover are separated by just a couple of miles, the two high schools haven’t competed much against each other on the athletics fields.

For one thing, the schools are much different in terms of enrollment size. Westover’s high school enrollment is more than three times the size of Deerfield-Windsor, and that’s using numbers from prior to Albany High’s closure.

The schools are also members of different athletics associations. The GHSA, of which Westover is a member, didn’t allow competition against the GISA, of which Deerfield-Windsor is a member, until a recent bylaw change.

That wall between associations, however, is starting to fall. And one of the first places that competition is playing out is on the cross country trails.

Led by a sophomore runner who has posted some significant race wins this season, Westover’s boys cross country team is giving Deerfield-Windsor, long one of the top cross country programs in the GISA, a bit of a push.

“We enjoy the enhanced competition,” Deerfield-Windsor head coach Jake Clawson said of running against GHSA programs. “We want to be the best program in South Georgia, and this gives us the chance to prove that. And you’ve got to do that every year.

“Every year is different. Talent ebbs and flows. But when we race against these bigger schools, it shows what our kids have.”

That emerging rivalry of sorts was on display Sept. 9 at the Lee County Invitational.

Two Deerfield-Windsor runners, Ethan Merritt and Porter Hill, went step-to-step with Westover’s Henry Plowden, who opened the season with a victory in the Saucony Kickoff Classic in Savannah.

It was a close race the whole way around the Lee County Middle School West campus. Plowden and Merritt sprinted across an open field toward the finish line, with Plowden charging forward up the crest of a small hill at the end of the second lap and into the finish chute first, arms raised in victory.

“Porter was just flying that first mile,” Plowden said. “I was just trying to hang on for those first two miles. As soon as he started fading, I just thought, ‘It’s time to go, Henry. You’ve got it.’ “

In terms of team competition, Deerfield-Windsor still dominates. The Knights placed three runners in the top 10 that day, with Merritt in second, Hill in third and Graham Ford in seventh, winning the team title by 29 points over second-place Valdosta.

Westover, which finished fifth as a team, had its No. 2 runner finish 16th and had its third runner finish 30th.

The competition at the front of the pack, however, is making things interesting. And that is giving both teams some preparation for their respective state competitions.

“It’s great for both schools in cross country,” Plowden said. “It helps us all around, very well.”

Both teams host their own races in the next two weeks. Deerfield-Windsor hosts a race Saturday at Albany State West, while Westover will have a home meet Sept. 30.

Deerfield-Windsor tackles state competition first, running Oct. 28 in Athens at the GISA meet. The GHSA championship meet is the following weekend in Carrollton.

“In cross country, the only race that matters is the last one,” Clawson said. “It isn’t like football, where you have regular-season records or anything like that. (The Lee County meet) for us was a tune-up, it’s a workout, it shows us where we are. It’s a benchmark.”