CENTER VALLEY - Tyler Stelmack knows the DeSales University cross country course. He's run it plenty of times in his career.

The Northwestern senior used his knowledge of the course to earn a fourth-place finish Saturday in the 34th Annual DeSales Invitational. Tiger teammate Haley Yost ran to a fifth-place finish in the girls race as six area runners took home medals, which went to the top 25 finishers in the varsity races.Pleasant Valley's Kristen Eberhardt was 10th. Northwestern's Rachelle Cerrone (12th) and Carly Pierce (18th) also earned medals. In the boys race, Pleasant Valley's Alex Larkin placed 12th.Stelmack, the defending Colonial League champ, said he was around 40th place before making his move on the hills in the last half of the course."I'm really happy with how I ran today," Stelmack said. "I played it smart. I didn't want to go out fast in the first mile because you hit all these hills then. I used my hill strength to catch back up to the front."Stelmack led Northwestern's boys team to a seventh-place finish against a field of some strong teams from all over the eastern part of the state. It's the most competitive Tiger team he's been a part of in three years of high school cross country."We trained all summer," Stelmack said. "At the Moravian Academy Invitational we were first in 2A. As of now we're 6-0 in the league. We're really happy with where we are."Yost, who has been dealing with a knee injury since early in the preseason, is used to being on strong teams. She led the Northwestern girls team to a fourth-place finish Saturday. The Lady Tigers graduated three of their top five runners from last year's District 11 Class AAA runner up, but seem to have picked up right where they left off last year."I feel like people always seem to doubt us because we always lose senior runners," said Yost. "We just keep coming back and proving everybody wrong. We like that position."Yost, a junior, was the Colonial League runner up last year. She prefers shorter races, like the mile and half mile in track. But she's worked hard on distance training in the offseason to improve on her cross country performances."Hoping to go sub-19 at least one race this year," said Yost. "This summer I was training a lot more than other years. Usually I'm more a tack runner with the speed. I'm building up more endurance."Eberhardt, a Mountain Valley Conference track champ in the mile, placed first at the Bears only regular season meet before coming to DeSales.A seventh-place finisher at last year's MVC meet and a 38th-place finisher at districts, Eberhardt is hoping for a big junior year in 2012."I'd really like to make it to states this year," she said. "I'd like to be No. 1 in my league and at least place in the top 10 at districts."Larkin also won his only regular season conference meet this year, was competing in his fourth DeSales Invitational, ran to his best finish of his high school career. He was hoping for top 10, but was not too disappointed to miss his goal by two places."I kind of wanted to get top 10," he said. "I still medaled, which is nice. I wanted to do better time-wise than I did."I was around 15th a lot of the race. The last half mile I was able to pass three people."With Saturday's humidity, few runners came across the finish line under their goal times. But they all got a good early-season taste of some of the competition that they will see a little over a month down the road."It gives me a look at how districts and possibly states is going to look with all the runners from all over," said Larkin.]DeSales Invitational ResultsGIRLS1. Summer Hill (Honesdale) 19:39.62, 2. Meredith Colton (Bangor) 19:53.84, 3. Sarah Brzostek (Exeter) 20:15.21, 4. Mikayla Stoudt (Parkland) 20:26.96, 5. Haley Yost (Northwestern) 20:39.16, 6. Anna Simpson (Boyertown) 20:39.82, 7. Shaina Palmer (Freedom) 20:45.64, 8. Casey Ortiz (Archbishop Wood) 20:50.69, 9. Shelby White (Southern Lehigh) 21:02.12, 10. Kristen Eberhardt (Pleasant Valley) 21:07.39.Other local finishers in top 10012. Rachelle Cerrone (Northwestern), 18. Carly Pierce (Northwestern), 37. Jenny Beers (Lehighton), 45. Samantha Young (Pleasant Valley), 46. Dana McAllister (Pleasant Valley), 50. Katelyn Slack (Pleasant Valley), 53. Erin Ondush (Northwestern), 62. Lauren Alden (Northwestern), 65. Abigail Kaspszyk (Pleasant Valley), 68. Emily Oldt (Lehighton), 70. Katrina Hartman (Northwestern), 71. 71. Mykayla Beichy (Pleasant Valley), 76. Cassie Rehnert (Lehighton), 77. Rachel Hendrix (Northern Lehigh), 83. Marie Mikols (Northwestern), 84. Amanda Mann (Palmerton).Team scores(Top 5 plus area teams)1. Archbishop Wood 90, 2. Parkland 100, 3. Boyertown 112, 4. Northwestern 140, 5. Honesdale 166, 8. Pleasant Valley 202, 18. Northern Lehigh 481.BOYS1. Jonathan Schmidt (Archbishop Wood) 17:05.45, 2. Matt Koch (Stroudsburg) 17:14.18, 3. Alex Balla (Quakertown), 4. Tyler Stelmack (Northwestern) 17:19.29, 5. Alex Lederer (Northampton) 17:25.60, 6. Curtis Lamp (Exeter) 17:26.70, 7. Trevor Bergen (Parkland) 17:27.53, 8. Coin McLaughlin (Quakertown) 17:31.32, 9. Mike Kane (William Tennent) 17:32.14, 10. Jaryd Flank (Wilson) 17:36.70.Other local finishers in top 10012. Alex Larkin (Pleasant Valley), 31. Ryan Cerrone (Northwestern), 44. Joseph Phillips (Pleasant Valley), 54. Patrick Strobel (Northwestern), 58. Jarett White (Northwestern), 65. Michael Sucic (Pleasant Valley), 70. Patrick Rimple (Pleasant Valley), 74. Mason Buskirk (Pleasant Valley), 78. Sean Seiler (Palmerton), 79. Joey Duffy (Northwestern), 81. Matt Pender (Northern Lehigh), 85. Thomas Stone (Pleasant Valley), 91. Alex Hoffner (Northern Lehigh), 93. William Anderson (Pleasant Valley), 94. Daulton Radler (Lehighton).Team scores(Top 5 plus area teams)1. Parkland 104, 2. William Tennent 107, 3. Perkiomen Valley 137, 4. Freedom 190, 5. Holy Ghost Prep 191, 7. Northwestern 223, 10. Pleasant Valley 261, 22. Northern Lehigh 582, 23. Palmerton 591, 24. Lehighton 616.