Last weekend, Liliah Gordon placed 7th in the Foot Locker Northeast Regional to earn a spot at Foot Locker Nationals.
Incredibly, she won’t be the only competitor in San Diego next weekend who attended Northern Burlington Middle School.
Sadie Krueger, a freshman at Moanalua High School in Honolulu, placed 6th Saturday in the West Regional in Walnut, Calif., and will join Gordon at Nationals.
Krueger attended Northern Burlington Middle School through last spring and was the 2023 New Jersey middle school cross country champion last fall before her family moved to Hawaii.
One more year and Krueger and Gordon would have been teammates. But Gordon and Krueger are good friends and will be reunited at the 45th annual Foot Locker National race at Balboa Park on Saturday.
Gordon ran 18:01 at Franklin Park last Saturday to earn one of the 10 qualifying spots. Krueger ran 18:27 this Saturday at Mt. SAC. She came through the mile in 5:37 in 6th place and two miles in 11:41 in 7th place. There were 107 runners in the West Region race and Krueger was the only one from Hawaii.
Krueger ran 5:07.91 for 1,600 meters last spring in a middle school race at Cherokee and 5:09.53 for a full mile at West Philly Nationals. She also ran 10:27.79 for 3,000 meters at West Philly Nationals.
This fall she placed either 1st or 2nd in every XC race she entered, capped by a triumph in the Honolulu Championships at Keopuolani Regional Park in Kahului, where she ran a 5,000 PR of 18:04.22.
Krueger is one of only two freshmen who will be in the field of 40 runners at Nationals. Tatum Flach of Park City, Utah, who finished two seconds and one spot in front of Krueger in the West Regional, is also a freshman.
The girls national championship is scheduled for 9:15 a.m. PST – that’s 12:15 p.m. EST – Saturday at Balboa Park in downtown San Diego.
From the Backstretch by Reuben Frank 
