The middle- and long-distance events are often the trickiest to predict when championship season arrives. History has shown that these races frequently feature athletes doubling—or even tripling—as top competitors look to score crucial points in their teams’ quest for State Meet supremacy.
Here, we’ll take a look at some of the returning athletes and make our predictions about what could unfold at the mid-February championship.
Without further ado, here’s the 1,000-, 1,500-, and 3,000-meter runs.
1,000m
In the past, no more than one or two runners have broken the three-minute barrier in this event. That could change this winter, as several athletes appear capable of dipping under the mark both in the months leading up to the State Meet and at the season-ending championship itself.
The top two performers in this race—and the only sub-3:00 runners from 2025—have both graduated: reigning champion Kiley DeFusco of Cumberland and Pilgrim’s Keaney Bayha.
The top returnee is North Kingstown’s Maura Whitney, who placed second to DeFusco at States with a best of 3:01.43. The Skippers’ Abby O’Neal could also be a major factor, depending on where her focus lies this season. O’Neal concentrated primarily on the 600 meters last winter, where she clocked a best of 1:41.24, but showed her range during the outdoor season. She excelled in the 800 meters, finishing third in a star-studded State Meet race with a personal best of 2:12.89.
By simple logic, those performances translate to legitimate sub-3 potential for the six-lapper on the indoor surface.
La Salle’s Alyssa Parenteau, North Kingstown’s Lucy Stowe, and Cumberland’s Charli McCue—all of whom have low three-minute efforts to their credit—could also challenge for a top podium spot at States, and a milestone time during the season. All three are likely to be called to duty more than once at the championship meet.
We wouldn’t be surprised if defending 600-meter champion Skylar Maxwell of Moses Brown competes in this event more frequently this winter. Maxwell was the runner-up to DeFusco in the 800 meters at outdoor states, lowering her PR by nearly five seconds to 2:11.70. An all-in Maxwell in this event could certainly produce a time in the low 2:50 range.
As always, it should be another interesting year in the 1K, particularly when it comes championship time.
1,500m
The top three finishers from last year’s State Meet have since graduated. Despite their absence, the talent coming back is anything but thin. Returning from the 2024–25 season are 10 runners who have broken five minutes, and with many of the same athletes featured, the depth is similar on the outdoor side as well.
Picking who will emerge as the champion from that group is about as difficult as predicting the exact time she’ll run, down to the tenth of a second. It’s no easy task. Basing our prognosis on what we saw during the outdoor season, we’ll list Mount Hope’s Jessica Deal and North Kingstown’s Lucy Stowe as co-favorites.
Much like the 800m, the two were part of an incredible 1,500m race in which all eight podium finishers cracked the 4:50 barrier. Deal placed second with a nearly 14-second personal best of 4:36.88, while Stowe lowered her best by more than seven seconds to take third overall.
Even accounting for the roughly 7–8 second differential between the two surfaces—favoring the outdoor oval—the edge still belongs to this talented duo, who no doubt gained a bucketload of confidence from their performances last June.
Who else can we count on to make things interesting up front? We have plenty. There’s La Salle junior Alyssa Parenteau, who won the Class A title in this event last spring and raced to an all-time best of 4:43.38 to finish fifth at the states. During an indoor season where she was coming off an injury that derailed most of her cross-country campaign, she was seventh at the states and ran an indoor best of 4:49.73 at the RITCA Invitational.
There are several other runners who could figure into the mix and post solid times this winter. How they perform at the State Meet, of course, also depends on how they’re called upon for the sake of their teams. Among that group are the Clippers’ Charli McCue, St. Raphael’s Mackenzie Lickert, La Salle’s Olivia Wahlberg, North Kingstown’s Abbie Tighe, North Smithfield’s Julia Dowling, and Bay View’s Jackie Mattos—just a few names in a deep and competitive field.
3,000m
At last year’s State Meet, Pilgrim’s Keaney Bayha took control from the start and won by seven seconds. This year, we expect the race to be slightly different, with several runners capable of challenging for the crown—and possibly dipping under 10 minutes during the season, at the State Meet, or both.
Usually, our top runners from the cross-country season are among the leaders in the 3K. That should be no different this year, except for individual XC champion CC Ludwig of Cumberland, who will be competing on her school’s swim team during the winter months.
From the fall campaign, you have to count the Saints’ Lickert as someone who can make a difference. She finished second at the states this past cross-country season. After a strong performance at the Brooks Northeast Championships, where she ran a PR of 18:37.3 for the 5K, Lickert indicated she’s eyeing a possible sub-10-minute 3K this winter. That goal is far from unrealistic based on her strength over uneven terrain. She already showed promise with an all-time best of 10:14.30 at a BU Mini Meet this past weekend—a time just under the 10:15.91 effort she ran to place third at indoor states. She was fifth during outdoor.
The North Kingstown tandem of Lucy Stowe and Abbie Tighe are also capable of winning come championship time, both having run 10:12 last winter. Tighe is coming off a cross-country season in which she placed fourth overall, despite missing nearly half of it due to health-related issues.
McCue and her Clipper teammate Gabby Stoothoff also cannot be ignored. We’re predicting big gains from Stoothoff, who improved dramatically this past cross-country season, lowering her 5K PR by more than two minutes from her sophomore year to a sixth-place time of 18:57.3 at the states.
