Determination, Spirit and Guts: Bishop Hendricken is NXN Bound

Jim Doyle, longtime head coach of Bishop Hendricken in R.I., had every reason to believe that his team had a shot at capturing the overall title at the Nike Cross-Country National Northeast Regional Championships this past Saturday.

 

Coming into the meet, Doyle’s squad had an impressive list of quality placements in previous autumn races. On Oct. 3 in North Carolina, Hendricken competed among the best on the east coast and finished second in the Race of Champions at the Great American Cross-Country Festival. In early November, the Hawks cruised to their 18th state crown in three decades with an easy 42-point victory over a very good Barrington High team. Two weeks later, they were the recipients of a New England Championship crown.

 

While all those races were noteworthy, the most convincing performance that had Doyle thinking his Hawks were more worthy of their sixth seed prior to the regionals occurred just a week after their runner-up finish at the Great American. Despite No.2 runner Brian Doyle and varsity teammate Drew Manning battling sickness, Hendricken placed a respectable 12th at the prestigious Manhattan College High School Cross-Country Invitational at Van Cortland Park.

 

The meet, which attracts an excellent mixture of top-level teams from the east, was won by Christian Brothers Academy in N.Y., with 116 points. Hendricken collected 238 points for its finish.

 

“We had two of our top runners sick and we still finished 12th,” Jim Doyle said. “I figured in the team scoring if those two runners were healthy we could have beat Christian Brothers and won the meet. That race knocked us out of our (national) team ranking.”

 

This past Saturday at the NXN regionals, held at Bowdoin State Park in Wappinger Falls, N.Y., Hendricken knocked out Christian Brothers and everyone else with its surprising (at least to its competition) win. The Hawks defeated second-place Germantown (Penn.) Friends, 137-156, to earn the coveted hardware and their all-expense paid trip to next week’s championship meet.

 

“Tuesday night (before the meet) we had a team meeting and went over everything. We knew if we stuck with our race plan we could be up there,” Doyle said. “Our goal always was to win. We knew we had a pretty good shot.”

 

As it turned out, the success was contagious for teams within close proximity to the Warwick school. In the girls’ race, Bishop Feehan in nearby Attleboro, Mass., captured the team prize. Taking second was La Salle Academy, located in the capital city of Providence.

 

“It’s a really nice feeling with all three of us ending up making it (to the nationals). It’s incredible,” said Doyle, whose daughter Erin competes on the Feehan squad. “It’s a really great day for all three schools - probably one of the greatest ever.”

 

At the regionals, Hendricken had four of its runners crack 17 minutes on Bowdoin Park’s demanding five-kilometer layout, led by a tenth-place showing (eighth among teams competing) from senior Jake Sienko with his time of 16 minutes, 17 seconds. The remaining quartet consisted of senior Brian Doyle in 18th (14th) at 16:27, senior Mike MacKenzie finishing in 37th (28th) in 16:51 and junior Ryan Meehan placing 38th (29th) with a 16:55 clocking.

 

One of the key placements came in the No. 5 position where junior Andrew Andraka completed the scoring by taking 78th overall (58th) with his time of 17:27.

 

“He surprised me,” Jim Doyle said. “He never quit. He stepped in. He’s normally our seventh man.”

 

Typical of the landscape in upstate New York, Bowdoin Park provided a challenging course for the several hundred participants that graced the starting line. It begins with about a quarter-mile stretch of flat terrain and then goes into a steady, uphill climb until the halfway mark. Runners are then greeted to a steep descend before the course levels out for the final 1,000 meters.

 

Doyle had one simple plan for his team, one that it carried out to perfection.

 

“I told them to get out, to get out strong for that first uphill climb (at a half mile),” he said. “We knew we had to get out fast to be in the race. Our plan was to get out and hold our position, which they did.”

 

When it comes to competing, the motivation to excel comes in many different forms. For the members of the Hawks’ cross-country team, their prime motivator came from above. The Hawks were running in honor of Bobby Doyle, a former world-class marathoner who died of a heart attack two years ago at age 58. Doyle, who dominated the roads in R.I. from the mid-1970s to the late 1980s, was the father of Brian Doyle and brother to the Hendricken coach.

 

“The night before I asked all the kids who they wanted to dedicate this race to,” Jim Doyle recalled. “I said I want to dedicate this race to you guys. Mike MacKenzie got up and said, “Let’s dedicate it to Bobby. He’s the one that always told us to run with guts.’ Somehow I believe the spirit of Bobby was with us.”

 

After enjoying a successful 10 years at St. Raphael Academy, Doyle is entering his 17th year as the Hendricken coach where his teams have won nine of their cross-country titles and a bundle of championship plaques at the indoor and outdoor state meets.

 

In terms of cross country, he ranks his latest batch of harriers at the top.

 

“I said it was one of the best after we won the New Englands,” he said. “After (Nike), they are clearly the best I have ever coached. They are clearly the best team. You have to have a special brand of guys. They are not individuals. We are clearly a team.”

 

Right now, everything appears to be clicking for the Hawks. Sienko is the ringleader of this year’s squad. He copped the individual crown at the RIIL State Championship with a time of 15:56.92 for the 5K race. He was also sixth at Manhattan and was third at Great American where he ran a personal best of 15:20.

 

Brian Doyle has been a steady number two. He had an off-day at the state meet, placing 19th overall. But he has rebounded nicely with a solid showing at the NE meet where he was the sixth R.I. finisher and with his top-20 placement at Nike.

 

“I think he just kind of lost focus at the state meet. He really sets high standards. He learned that from his dad,” said the elder Doyle about his determined nephew. “At the New Englands he was just 10 seconds behind Jake. I think he learned from (the state meet). He really has been running well since then.”

 

The Hawks’ best will be lacing up their shoes one more time this cross-country season when they try to win the school their first national title at the NXN championship meet this Saturday at the Portland Meadows Race Track in Oregon. It’s a goal that Doyle now feels may not be completely out of reach.

 

Hendricken’s appearance at the meet along with La Salle will be the first time that any schools from R.I. have competed at the NXN in its six-year history.

 

“When you’re there, anything can happen,” Doyle said. “These guys have so much character, so much will that on any given day they can compete with the best teams in the nation. I told the team, ‘Just do your best, anything can happen.’”

 

(All Photos Courtesy of Tim Fulton, ArmoryTrack.com)