It wasn’t obvious at the Post Falls River Run at Kiwanis Park to open the season.

Not even a few weeks after that at another meet in Spokane.

But at some point, 14-year Post Falls cross country coach Brian Trefry knew.

Now, after an 11-year wait, the rest of the region has found out what Trefry knew. His girls team, well, they can compete with anyone.

“It was a little bit later in the year,” Trefry said. “I knew we were going to be good. As the year kind of went on, especially going into the regional meet, I was pretty confident we were going to qualify for state, it was just a matter of finishing second or winning.”

As it so happened, thanks to a second-place finish by junior Ida Mae Brooks, followed by top-five finishes by freshman Sydney Shanahan (third) and sophomore Jazzmin Kernodle (fourth), the Trojans clipped seven-time regional champion Coeur d’Alene by three points for the regional title — the Trojans’ first since 2005 and first since moving up to the 5A classification in 2006.

“Going into it, I’d thought I’d really like to win it, but second isn’t that bad,” said Trefry, who had never qualified a full girls team to state. “If we had gotten second, we’re still going to state and going to come out of it well. Right before the meet, I knew we had a chance.”

Cross country is often a race of strategy, with runners often running in packs in order for scoring purposes. At the William Johnson Invitational in Sandpoint earlier this month, Shanahan was pacing with Coeur d’Alene senior Caitlin Conway with the purpose of having teammate Brooks find a way to win the race.

“That race, it was different for me,” Shanahan said. “I was really scared because I was really all by myself, but it more scary because it was a realization that I could do this.”

Both Brooks and Kernodle qualified for the state meet in 2015 at Farragut State Park. This year, everyone goes, with Myrisa Laufenberg and Hailey Sessions the only two seniors on this year’s roster. Freshmen Bailey Shanahan, Arayah Brown and Mikayla Butler round out the roster heading to state (Sessions is the alternate).

“From that point forward (at the Sandpoint meet) and looking back, I knew we’d have Ida Mae and Jazzmin since they were both (2015) state qualifiers and great runners,” Trefry said. “I knew that we had fantastic senior leadership with Myrisa and Hailey, so that combination, I knew we’d be pretty good. But the freshman talent, I knew was going to be good, but didn’t know how good they’d be. Four of our eight going down are freshmen, so that says a lot for their ability. It’s really been a great combination of freshmen with some great ability and experience back, and just really, really good senior leadership.”

Sydney Shanahan said her goal has been simple all year — stay with her fraternal twin sister Bailey during races.

“My goal was to stick with my sister Bailey since she’s usually faster than me,” Sydney Shanahan said. “This team has been like a family. They’re all like brothers and sisters.”

Winning the regional title — after 11 years — was still a shock to Brooks.

“I thought we had a chance of going to state for sure,” Brooks said. “When I crossed that finish line, I knew I’d given it all I had. When I looked at the rest of the finishers, we were all really close. I didn’t think we’d won, and honestly thought we’d gotten second for sure.”

And when she was wrong ...

“I was so proud because we’d given all we had,” Brooks said. “All year, at every practice. We deserved to win, we really did. We’ve been so close this year, and there hasn’t been any drama or fighting. I could never ask for a better group to be around. We honestly care about each other and we don’t judge each other for being a little slower. We’re encouraging each other, from the first- to last-place finisher. We’re all part of this team.”

The 5A girls race is scheduled for Saturday at 12:15 p.m. PDT at the Portneuf Wellness Complex in Pocatello.

“I think my goal will be to keep up with Caitlin (Conway) again,” Sydney Shanahan said.

“Last week, our mindset was we’re going to celebrate this and we’re going to be happy,” Trefry said. “And I told them on Friday, enjoy the weekend, and come back on Monday ready to compete. We’re happy with what we did, but the focus now is to go down and do the best we can and compete for every spot. It’s a little difficult to know where we’ll fit in as far as the team standings, because we haven’t competed against some of the teams from down there. We can compare times and courses, but unless you’re on the same course, it’s just guesstimating. To me, I really don’t know where we’ll be, but it really doesn’t matter, because we’ll go down and compete as hard as we can, finish as high as we can and see what happens.”

Mountain View of Meridian, Boise and Eagle are expected to be among those to watch from District 3 (Boise area).

“I’ll look at those schools and see what they ran at the first invitational of the year, where they ran at the Bob Firman Invitational (at Eagle Island State Park), and see where they’re at,” Trefry said. “But it’s just guesstimating right now. The only way you can tell is that if we all run on the same course on the same day, and we don’t have that. We definitely don’t have the attitude that we’re just happy to be there. We are, but we’re not content with that.”

And though they’re the oldest on the team as seniors, Laufenberg and Sessions aren’t just along for the ride.

“We’re super excited to qualify finally,” said Laufenberg, a four-year varsity member and co-captain of the team. “We’ve both been working hard since our freshman year each and every summer, so we’re excited that it finally paid off.”

Sessions agreed and said while there was doubts, sticking with the program was the right decision.

“There was definitely times you wondered why you keep pushing,” Sessions said. “But I’m glad that I did. We’ve have some good moments this year for sure.”

“It was kind of heartbreaking when you get up to that moment and keep coming up short,” Laufenberg said. “But it’s a great way to end our senior year. Neither one of us are coordinated with anything else but running, so this is what we stuck with.”

Kernodle split time between the soccer team and cross country for the second straight year.

“It’s hard for me to pick from the two sports,” Kernodle said. “I’ve played soccer and ran cross country all of my life, and I just don’t think I could in my heart quit one.”

Kernodle has missed some meets to play soccer and vice versa, but hasn’t missed a beat on the course.

“I’ve been really busy, but I love my team,” Kernodle said. “They’ve made it fun to be here. It feels awesome because our entire girls team is going to state.”

Brooks finished 33rd and Kernodle 61st at state last year.

“I had a tough year with some injuries,” Brooks said. “This year, just giving my all and finishing second at regionals, I felt really strong. It’s my junior year and I’ve really got to start racing hard. Honestly, I just wanted to do it for the seniors too, because we’ve been trying to get to state and we’ve always been close. I just wanted to give it all I had for them and get them to state this year.”

Now that they’ve arrived, it doesn’t look like they’re going to be sneaking up on anyone anytime soon.