Ten Class A Boys Teams With Shots At Winning In 2018

North Shore

Composed of Cook County High School and Two Harbors High School, the North Shore squad surprised a lot of people with their fifth-place finish at State because they weren't really on many people's radar when the season started (even though they had two individual State qualifiers in 2016, including Noah Smith as a freshman). But like Saint James and LQPVDB, they will have a big hurdle to overcome thanks to the graduation of top senior Jake Paron, who took 15th individually last year, even though they return six of their other seven runners. And like Loyola, they will count heavily on the improvement of current fifth-runner Leif Anderson, who followed up a big PR at State with an solid year on the track, in the absence of significant depth behind their number five runner. But with a strong top four who are all juniors or sophomores, North Shore won't be surprising anyone this year with how good they will be.