OBETZ — Second-place finishes were fine with Heartland Christian senior Rebecca Geiss.

Geiss placed second at the Ohio high school state cross country meet for the second straight year Saturday after being state champion as a sophomore.

“I came out and ran for my Lord and any results would make me happy,” she said.

Geiss was second out of 214 girls runner in Ohio’s first-ever Division IV state cross country championship. She finished the 3.1-mile course at Fortress Obetz in 18 minutes, 11.81 seconds.

“I would have liked to have had a better time, but the state meet is about competing and placing,” she said.

Geiss placed second at the district, regional and state cross country meets the past three weekends.

“I wasn’t thinking about winning. I was just running my race,” she said. “It make me feel really fortunate being here four years.”

Geiss missed most of her junior track season with a stress fracture in her foot and still finished fifth in the Division III 3200-meter run in June. She has looked better than ever since getting healthy.

“This season was about recovering from my injury,” she said. “This whole season it’s been about doing everything to keep me healthy and strong.”

Three of the top four runners from the Boardman regional placed in the top four at state — Smithville senior Kaitlyn Carr (17:29.19) in first, Geiss second and McDonald sophomore Naomi Sheesley was fourth (18:38.94) for the second year in a row.

Carr, a University of Notre Dame recruit, led the entire race and was 13 seconds out front after the first mile. The only one who had a chance to catch her was Geiss.

“I wasn’t thinking about that,” Geiss said. “She’s a great runner. We’ve been racing against each other since the seventh grade and have pushed each other.”

Geiss plans on running a couple of indoor track meets to get ready for the upcoming track season. Her high school career as one of the most accomplished girls runners in Columbiana County history will end in June.

“I just want to be a leader for these girls,” she said. “I don’t want them to see my success. I want them to see I’m doing it for the Lord.”

Meet notes

¯ The temperature was 44 degrees at the start of Geiss’ race, the first of eight on Saturday.

¯ Geiss plans to run in a pair of national qualifiers later this month — the Nike Midwest regional in Terre Haute, Indiana, on Nov. 16 and Brooks Midwest Championships in Kenosha, Wisconsin, on Nov. 29.

¯ Athens senior and Duke University recruit Sophia Szolosi repeated as state champion, winning the Division II girls race in 17:02.50, a Fortress Obetz course record.

It is the second-fastest time in state meet history, just missing the mark of 16:59.8 set by Katy Radkewich of Cleveland Heights Beaumont in 1996 at Scioto Downs. She won that race by 1 minute and 46 seconds.

¯ The top four teams from the Boardman regional finished in the top nine in the Division III girls — Woodridge placed fifth (168), Salem sixth (256), Akron St. Vincent-St. Mary seventh (272) and Marlington ninth (289).

¯ The state cross country meet expanded from three to four divisions this year, the biggest change in the boys meet since goings from two divisions to three in 1970.

The expansion includes 24 teams qualifying for state in Divisions II, III and IV and remained at 20 teams in Division I. OHSAA first went to 20 teams at state in 2016, up from 16.

A total of 184 boys and girls teams qualified for state this year, an increase from 120 last year.

¯ There were 556 more runners at the state meet Saturday than last year due to the expansion. There were 1,647 boys and girls runners on Saturday, an increase from 1,091 last year.