GRAY — The Long County Blue Tide cross country teams have had a lot of success over the last few years and the 2024 season has been no different. On Saturday, November 2, the teams competed in the sectionals at Joney County Cross Country Course with hopes of advancing to the state championship.

Not only did they advance to the state meet, but they brought home some hardware in the form of the girls’ region championship trophy.

The Lady Tide has finished as region runner-up the last two seasons and looked to finally get over that hump. They did just that as they finished with the best time out of Region 3-AAA teams competing.

They finished with 160 points and placed fourth overall out of the four regions and 19 teams competing. They beat out Southeast Bulloch for their first region championship.

Macey Higgason paced the Lady Tide at ninth with a time of 22:54. Mackenzie Spurgeon, Bella Lucas, Tamiya Gamble- Copeland, Xia Dyson, Cayla Soule and Kadyn Higgason round out the Lady Tide.

The boys finished as region runner-up just 26 points behind Southeast Bulloch. The boys finished third overall out of 25 teams competing.

Shawn Young paced the boys’ team as he finished in fourth with a time of 17:51. Trevor Kuchar, Jose Tellez-Baltazar, Isaiah Clark, Alenjandro Bonilla, Demonte Clark, and Matthew Tewalt round out the boys teams.

This is the third consecutive year that head coach David White and assistant coach Kelsey Persinger have led both boys and girls teams to the state meet.

They will advance to the state championship meet on Saturday, November 9 in Carrollton.