Although Emma Miller of Middletown High easily won the cross country meet Monday afternoon with a time of 16:25, Mercy High School placed six runners in the top 10 and retained the trophy by winning the meet 24-33 at Veteran's Memorial Park.

"The two Miller sisters are really good, this race was for a trophy which was donated by Puorro Electric but we didn't bring it with us today," Mercy coach John Hastings said. "(Middletown) has got a good team."

As the regular season for cross country is close to ending, Hastings' crew was perhaps not as focused as he would've liked. His top runner, Michelle Kacich finished second behind Emma Miller with a time of 16:38 and teammate Anne Sullivan (16:51) was close behind her.

Mercy is now 8-1 overall and has completed the season by being crowned the champions of the Quinnipiac division of the Southern Connecticut Conference. Middletown's undefeated season came to a halt with the loss and is now 10-1 overall.

"Our big meet is Thursday (the SCC meet) ..our biggest meets are still to come," Hastings said. "This is the fourth year in a row we've won (the divisional title)."

Mercy's only loss this season came from Guilford, which will be running at the SCC meet this Thursday. In the upcoming meet, Hastings said. there will be about 17 teams from the three divisions in the SCC that will be competing.

Middletown's Celia Miller finished fourth, her time coming in at 17:03, although she was running second behind her sister for nearly half of the meet. After the major hill, she lost a few steps and trailed the two Mercy runners in the final quarter mile or so.

"I'm really proud of her ..I told her she needed to beat the two Mercy girls," Celia said of her sister. Celia said that the reason for her drop off in the race was she felt slightly nauseated during her run.

At the first break where the spectators can see the runners come through the woods, Emma led Celia by about 10 feet with about 20 feet between them and a pair of Mercy runners. At the second break through the trees, Emma had easily extended her lead on Kacich but Celia had dropped to third.

"I heard the girl coming up behind me, but I didn't want her to beat me," Emma said. "It's a good course, there was nothing bad on it. I love this course ..I like running through the woods, it's nicer than running on the street."

Hastings team is being led this season by a solid core of seniors including Kacich, Anne Sullivan and Sara Raider who, he says, are running well this year.

"(Kacich) is a senior, this is her best season ever, she's really working hard this year," Hastings said. "Five of the top seven are seniors, the class is carrying the team, they're good leaders."