The Reversal Of Fortunes

t's exciting to beat a team this year that beat us last year by a score of 15-50," confided Jake Matthes,coach of the Cross Country team This excitment stemmed from the reversal of fortunes thatgavethe 1978 CrossCountry team a dualmeet record of9-3, ascompared to an 8-11 season the year before Speaking of the team members Coach Matthes said, "There was much improvement over last year,with times going down as a whole Also, we had real depth, with eleven good runners and noi a single poor one."

Another exciting reversal took place at the NAIA District 19 meet Going into the meet Coach Matthes said that their goal was "just to get out of the cellar." Imagine the surprise to all,including the Flames,when they came in second beating the third place team by 39 points and losing to the firstplace team by only 4 points!

Placing in that meet were Marty Frisk,second; Bob Holter,fifth;Mike Phillips,seventh; Bob Bracken,tenth; and Tim Black,eighteenth.

Th e Reversal Of Fortunes

The next post-season meet was the NCCAA District IIwhich theFlames won handedly, placing five inthe top ten. Marty Frisk wasfirst;BobKelly, third; Bob Holier,sixth;MikePhillips, eighth; andGreg Smith,ninth

The last andbestreversaltook place at the NCCAA National meet which involved 19 schools and96runners From the ninth place gained lastyear, the Flames this year jumped sixplaces and grabbed third place Marty Frisk, honored with All-American status, placed 8th; BobKelly was 16th;Steve Buie was22nd; Mike Manna was 30th; and Mike Phillips was33rd, allplacing in the topthird ofthefinishers