Logan County Cross Country hosted the 2025 Super Regionals on it’s new course this last weekend. The responses and comments from the 30+ coaches, the KHSAA and the meet officials were absolutely amazing to hear. Parents were stopping Logan County race staff and telling them how much they loved the campus and how spectator friendly the course is.
Adding to the success, the Cougars finished second in the multi-team race and qualified for this weekend’s state meet in Lexington.
Logan County boys running were Cole Christmas, Gabe Masterman, SJ Hughes, Jack Blanton, Casey Slaughter, Wyatt Lawson and Garrett Lawson.
This is how Coach Sye Head described the performance of the runners;
“SJ Hughes is just a 7th grader who came out and ran a near 60-second personal best. I couldn’t ask for anything else aside from his best effort, and it’s clear he made that happen. Incredible run by SJ.
“Jack Blanton led the team, finishing 8th overall as a sophomore with a time of 17:51.
“Wyatt Lawson led our pack through the entirety of the race, picking off runners through every mile. He finished 12th overall in just his third 5k of the season. He spent most of the season in ROTC Raiders competitions.
“Cole Christmas, a first-year runner, ran a 45-second personal best while sitting on Wyatt’s shoulder all day. Cole ran down three competitors in the last half mile and placed 14th overall just 1/4 second out of being right behind Wyatt. Truly an incredible run for him, and awesome to see him running people down in the last two minutes of the race just like we planned all year. He is already ranked 7th in the region going into next year, and. I cannot imagine what he’s able to accomplish in a second season knowing what he knows now/
“Senior, Casey Slautgher finished in 19th with Garrett Lawson finishing 39th rounding out our top 5 in scoring.
“Junior Gabe Masterman has been injured most the season and came back with less than 2 weeks of training and still ran a 70 second personal best for us.”
Coach Head continued. “One thing I can guarantee for sure is that every single runner that wore LC on their shirt on Saturday gave every inch of effort they had. We had a shot to win it all, anyone that’s been around us all year knows that, but Union County came out and set six personal records in a day, with some runners running over 100 seconds faster than they did just a month ago at our invitational. Union County ran the best race I have ever watched in person, and there’s no way we were taking them on that day. We will look for our redemption at state.”
The Cougars tied for second overall with Paducah Tilghman, which had won region the last two years. Logan’s fate was decided by literally 1/100th of a second. But we qualified our entire boys team for the state meet this Saturday! We ended up beating multi-decade rival Webster County by six points. They won regionals for 8 years straight, and everyone was “absolutely shocked we were able to take them down,” Head says/
The last time a team went to state from Logan County was nearly a decade ago. Head says, “What these boys accomplished in merely three months is remarkable. When I accepted this position we didn’t have a team. Everyone had quit besides maybe two athletes. I spent the first two months making visits to athletes’ families and homes to share the vision we had for simply preserving the heritage we once had in this program. I met with parents and athletes at the school before we were practicing, called parents, messaged parents; It was a lot more than I was ever expecting to take on, but I’m so glad we pushed and earned who we ended up with.
“These boys are incredible. They bought in and believed in themselves. Two years ago they placed dead last in the region. Last year they didn’t even have a team. This year we’re ranked top 15 in the state. If we had Casey, Wyatt and Garrett for another year, we quite literally would win regionals in a landslide next year. I’m going to miss those boys dearly after this season.”
Head offers a huge “thank you” to Noah Thomas for helping coach the team all over the course Saturday, and to Coach Todd Adler, Coach Josh Frick, Coach Michael Crawford and Carrie Kelley for helping us host a flawless event this weekend.
“We would have never been able to do what we’ve done without them. Coaches Adler, Frick and Crawford may have thought I was crazy when we first started this thing back in May, but we are finally reinstating the Logan County Cross Country excellence that existed from 2008 - 2018. We are so excited, especially with one of the best elementary teams in the state rising up to varsity age next year.”
Head adds, ““We leave for state Friday morning and the school has been gracious enough to cover our hotel rooms. If anyone would like to donate to the team to help cover our food expenses for the two days we are gone, please feel free to do so!”