Edison’s McElroy is third at CIF

Matt McElroy finished third Saturday at Mt. San Antonio College at the CIF Southern Section Division II boys’ cross-country championships in 14 minutes, 41 seconds.

The Edison senior has bigger goals in mind, though, and they start this Saturday at the CIF State meet in Fresno.

“I kind of don’t even want to talk about [getting third at CIF],” McElroy said. “I was pretty disappointed about it but I want to leave it behind me. It didn’t go well because I didn’t really train for Mt. SAC.”

McElroy would like to win the CIF State meet, or at least get top three. He feels like that’s what he’s capable of doing, with where he’s at in his training. Yet he’s also looking toward the Foot Locker Regionals. The west regional is Dec. 5 at Mt. SAC, and qualifiers will advance to the national championships Dec. 12 at Balboa Park in San Diego.

Last year, McElroy finished fifth in Division II at the state meet with a then-personal best time of 15:13.

Among other locals at the CIF divisional finals, the Marina boys placed 11th in Division I, paced by the 15th place individual finish of junior Karl Baranov (15:22).

The Fountain Valley girls finished ninth in Division I. The Barons were paced by junior Carmille Garcia in 15th individually (18:19) and senior Erika Recupero (18:28) in 25th.

The top seven teams from each division advanced to the state meet.