ATHOL — The trio of Elizabeth Storms, Ruthie Laughridge and Delaney Barron powered the Sandpoint girls cross country team to a second-place finish at the Timberlake Invitational on Saturday. 

The Sandpoint trio built a block, finishing 8th, 9th and 11th, to score the second-fewest points. The Bulldogs’ Charli Hall and Sophie Brubaker rounded out the scoring, finishing 20th and 22nd, giving Sandpoint 70 points, 24 less than McCall-Donnelly, who finished third. 

As a team, Sandpoint finished with the second-lowest spread between their scoring runners, with just 0:51 between Storms (20:31.67) and Brubaker (21:23.31). The Bulldogs easily cleared their 5A competition at the meet, with Moscow in eighth being the closest school while Lakeland finished ninth and Lewiston finished 12th. 

On the boys side, Sandpoint finished fourth, narrowly missing the podium by two points. The Bulldogs were once again led by junior Kai Budensiek, who finished fifth with a 15:55.94 final time.  

Budensiek was backed up by a 13th-place finish by Hobbes Conley (16:29.81), 18th place by Jack Lovin (16:44.81), a 32nd-place finish by Wyatt Lemon (17:45.72) and a 33rd-place finish by Riley Shadel (17:45.89). 

Despite missing the podium, Sandpoint was dominant over other 5A schools competing at the Timberlake meet. The closest 5A school to Sandpoint was Moscow, which finished ninth with its fastest runner finishing 27th. Lewiston, the other 5A school in the meet, finished 13th. 

The Bulldogs are back in action this Saturday, Sept. 19, at the Mountain West Classic at the University of Montana Golf Course.