Oklahoma 5A Cross Country Final Rankings 2025: The Poll Had It Backwards — Bishop Kelley Swept Both Titles

The final 5A polls of 2025, posted October 13, told one story. The state meet at Edmond Santa Fe on November 1 told a different one. In the boys’ race, the poll’s #2 beat its #1 by 58 points. On the girls’ side, a team ranked 13th finished fourth. This is the 2025 5A season rewind — poll versus reality, cross-referenced against the official meet report and a year of hindsight.

Boys: The Poll’s #2 Won by 58

The final boys poll (October 13) read: 1. Bishop McGuinness, 2. Bishop Kelley, 3. Southeast, 4. Collinsville, 5. Pryor, 6. Classen SAS, 7. Claremore, 8. Guthrie. Orderly. Confident. Wrong.

State meet final standings: 1. Bishop Kelley 54, 2. Bishop McGuinness 112, 3. Guthrie 120, 4. Classen SAS 135*, 5. Collinsville 135*, 6. Southeast 151, 7. Blanchard 195, 8. Pryor 198, 9. Claremore 242, 10. Tahlequah 247, 11. Shawnee 255, 12. Newcastle 262, 13. Thomas Edison 275, 14. Coweta 351. (*Classen SAS won the tiebreak on sixth runner.)

Read that again: Bishop Kelley 54, Bishop McGuinness 112. The poll’s second team beat its first by 58 points — more than the gap between 2nd and 6th. Kelley stacked four runners in the top 17 (2-6-13-16-17) with a 1:10.6 spread; that’s a championship profile, and the poll had it sitting second. Guthrie was ranked 8th and finished 3rd. Southeast was ranked 3rd and finished 6th. This wasn’t a poll, it was a preseason guess wearing a trench coat.

The tiebreak deserves its own paragraph, because the rulebook actually mattered: Classen SAS and Collinsville both finished on 135 points, and Classen took fourth because its sixth runner (83rd) beat Collinsville’s (89th). Team scores five, but the sixth and seventh runners displace — and in 2025, that rule decided fourth place.

Boys Individuals: A Dead Heat for the Crown

The finish-line camera couldn’t split them: Carter Gibson (Claremore, SR) and Eli Horeled (Bishop Kelley, SR) both crossed in 15:41.1 — a dead heat for the 5A individual title, gap 0.0. Luke Worthington (Bishop McGuinness, SR) was third in 16:04.6, Isaiah Blevins (Guthrie, SR) fourth in 16:16.8, and Logan Sanders (Duncan, JR) fifth in 16:23.3.

A note on the numbers, because this blog cross-references everything now: the Duncan Banner’s state recap reported Sanders at 16:36.2 — thirteen seconds off the official meet report’s 16:23.3. Local papers round; timing chips don’t. (The Banner also noted Duncan’s boys were crowned 5A Academic State Champions — the classroom title, which counts.)

And spare a thought for the irony: Claremore was 7th in the final poll and 9th as a team at state (242 points, a 3:58.4 spread) — yet produced the co-individual champion. Team polls rank teams, not heroes.

Girls: The Poll Nailed 1-2, Then Went Sideways

The final girls poll (October 13): 1. Bishop Kelley, 2. Bishop McGuinness, 3. Carl Albert, 4. Tulsa Edison, 5. Duncan, 6. Southeast, 7. Durant, 8. Blanchard, 9. Claremore, 10. Newcastle, 11. MacArthur, 12. Collinsville, 13. Tahlequah, 14. Guthrie, 15. Noble, 16. B.T. Washington.

State meet final standings: 1. Bishop Kelley 63, 2. Bishop McGuinness 97, 3. Thomas Edison 127, 4. Tahlequah 166, 5. Southeast 185, 6. Carl Albert 191, 7. Guthrie 193, 8. Claremore 213, 9. MacArthur 222, 10. Durant 229, 11. Duncan 237, 12. Pryor 245, 13. Blanchard 247, 14. Noble 254.

Credit where due: the poll got first and second exactly right, and Kelley earned it — four in the top seven (4-5-7-20-27). But below that, the poll was a rumor mill. Carl Albert, ranked 3rd, finished 6th. Duncan, ranked 5th, finished 11th — the pollsters saw one star and dreamed a whole team into existence. And Tahlequah — ranked 13th! — finished 4th. Nobody was watching Tahlequah. Somebody should have been.

Girls Individuals: Harper by 40 Seconds

Sylvie Harper (Bishop McGuinness, SO) won the 5A girls title in 18:17.0 — forty seconds clear of the field. That’s not a win, that’s a weather event. Jade Burnett (Thomas Edison, SR) was second in 18:56.7, Rio Dugas (Thomas Edison, SO) third in 18:58.1, Rubie Gross (Bishop Kelley, FR) fourth in 19:08.9, and Annabelle Gentry (Bishop Kelley, SO) fifth in 19:37.2. McGuinness had the individual champion; Kelley had the team. Depth wins in November.

The 2025 State Meet Was a Coming-Out Party

Here’s where a year of hindsight pays off. Look at the underclassmen from that 2025 state meet and compare them to this fall’s rankings: Rubie Gross went from 19:08.9 (4th, as a freshman) to 17:58 and the top of the 2026 Week 4 poll. Annabelle Gentry: 19:37.2 to 18:50. Kherington Smith: 19:46.9 to 19:24. Peyton Williams (Duncan): 20:08.0 (12th, as a freshman) to 19:23. Valerie Porras (Edison): 20:34.4 (19th, as a junior) to 18:38. The 2025 state meet was the preview; the 2026 season is the feature presentation.

Bishop Kelley swept both 5A titles in 2025 — 54 points and 63 points. The boys’ final poll had the order backwards by nearly sixty points, and the girls’ poll missed Tahlequah by nine places. October polls predict November badly. That’s not a complaint — it’s the whole reason this blog exists.

State meet results from the official DirectAthletics meet report (via ossaaillustrated.com and ohstrack.com); meet date confirmed on MileSplit’s 2025 5A/6A state championship page. Final polls from ohstrack.com, October 13, 2025. Duncan details via the Duncan Banner.