Will Squier was greeted by a grand total of three runners on his first day as Elk Lake cross country coach in 2001.

He only had to learn one name.

Two of the three runners were his two older children.

Much has changed since then.

Squier has made sure of it by developing what is arguably the finest small school cross country program in the state.

That work was honored Sunday when Squier was named District 2 Girls Cross Country Coach of the Year by NPF Sports.

The honor comes after Squier led the Lady Warriors to a second-place finish in Class A at the Pennsylvania Interscholastic Athletic Association Championships. Only a tiebreaker kept Elk Lake from finishing first.

Instead, the team posted its seventh top-two state finish in the past decade.

Squier said his faith has shaped his coaching philosophies, which include a strong emphasis on character building, and, therefore, he credits God for any recognition he receives from his team’s accomplishments.

After needing five years to build junior high teams and enough runners to consistently compete as a girls’ team, Squier’s Elk Lake squads have been nearly unstoppable.

The Lady Warriors went 22-1 this season and avenged their only loss by beating Holy Cross out of the District 2 Class A title to earn their shot in the state meet. NPF Sports also selected Elk Lake as the number-one girls’ cross country team in District 2, regardless of classification.

While the girls were going 22-1, the boys were 20-3, giving Squier 497 career dual wins in boys and girls combined.

Between the two teams, Squier has had 18 seasons with 20 or more wins, eight unbeaten finishes, 14 league or division titles, eight district champions, four state titles and six second-place state finishes. Elk Lake won a boys’ Class AA state title under Squier in 2008, swept both boys’ and girls’ Class AA state championships in 2010 and won another girls’ state title in Class A in 2012.

The Elk Lake girls have gone 232-10 in the Lackawanna League over the last 11 seasons.

Squier coached all three of his children at Elk Lake. Robert went on to run for Army at West Point while Jessica and Ellen also had college distance running careers.

In addition to cross country, Squier also coaches the Elk Lake boys’ and girls’ track and field teams.

During his high school days, Squier was part of two District 12 cross country championship teams at Montrose and won one individual district title.

Susquehanna County was well-represented on the NPF Sports all-District 2 team with five runners selected among the top 15 in the district for any class.

Elk Lake senior Justine Johns, Forest City senior Jennifer Korty and Montrose freshman Hannah Perkins were each all-District 2 selections. Elk Lake’s Keri Jones and Sadie Bosscher were second-team, all-district picks.

Johns was the Elk Lake’s teams leading runner in the district title and state runner-up finishes. She won her fourth straight state Class A individual medal by placing 18th.

Korty won the District 2 Class A title by almost 25 seconds and claimed a state medal by placing 23rd. She also won Cliff Robbins Invitational, Lackawanna County Commissioners’ Invitational and PIAA Foundation Meet titles.

Perkins made an impressive varsity debut, winning five of seven regular-season cluster meets. She placed third in District 2 Class A and 27th in the state, missing a medal by less than a second.

COLLEGE CORNER

Christine Zeck, a 5-foot-5 junior from Mountain View, has started the last five games for the Clarks Summit University women’s basketball team.

Clarks Summit, the former Baptist Bible College, has struggled through an 0-6 start.

Zeck is averaging 4.8 points, 5.0 rebounds, 1.2 assists and 1.2 steals per game while playing an average of 31.2 minutes. She is 10-for-31 (32.3 percent) from the floor and 4-for-9 (44.4) from the line.

As a sophomore, Zeck played just 24 minutes in five games as Clarks Summit went 4-17. She played five games, starting twice, as a freshman.

Zeck had two points each in her freshman and sophomore seasons.

THE WEEK AHEAD

Rich Emmons makes his head coaching debut in a special game Friday night.

The former Susquehanna assistant, who replaced John Warnero as Elk Lake boys’ basketball coach, will lead the Warriors into the Red Wallace Memorial Scholarship Game at Carbondale.

Wallace coached Elk Lake to state championships in 1969 and 1977. He played his high school basketball at Fell Township, which is not a part of the Carbondale Area School District.

The two schools have met each season since his death to honor the memory of the Wallace, who played for the Boston Celtics before returning to northeastern Pennsylvania and becoming a high school coach.

All six county boys’ teams open on the first legal playing date of the winter.

Blue Ridge plays Wyalusing at 6:30 and Susquehanna plays the host school at 8 in the Sayre Tip-Off Tournament, which is scheduled to conclude Saturday night.

Montrose is home against Mid Valley, Forest City is at Nanticoke and Mountain View is at Western Wayne in other boys’ basketball openers.

In girls’ basketball, Blue Ridge also opens with a two-day tournament, beginning Friday. The Towanda Basketball Tournament is scheduled to wrap up Saturday afternoon.

Susquehanna is home with Wyoming Area, Montrose is at Valley View and Elk Lake is at Tunkhannock in the other Friday openers.

Forest City opens Saturday in a 2:15 home game against Lakeland.

Mountain View makes its season debut Monday, Dec. 12 at home against Wyoming Area.

In wrestling, Montrose and Elk Lake get their seasons started at the Wyalusing Duals.

Mountain View and Blue Ridge do not get started until a week later when they join Montrose, Elk Lake and the rest of the league at the Lackawanna League Tournament.

TOM ROBINSON writes a weekly local sports column for the Susquehanna County Transcript. He can be reached online at RobbyTR@aol.com or followed on Twitter at @tomjrobinson.

MONSTER ENERGY IS NEW NASCAR SPONSOR

Brian France, NASCAR CEO

Monster Energy will become NASCAR's title sponsor starting with the 2017 season.

“Monster Energy is a brand built on excitement and enthusiasm, qualities that align with NASCAR,” said Brian France, NASCAR Chairman and CEO. “This sponsorship position is the most unique in all of sports and entertainment, and we are thrilled to have a partner that will help us further elevate the series. Today's announcement is the culmination of a thorough search, one that resulted in the right partner at this important time in our sport's history.

“Needless to say, this is a partnership that we want to build on over time. It's a very difficult agreement to come to because of the complexities of it, the track component, very important, media component is very important, all had to be sorted out, but nonetheless, we have reached a great spot.”

The company, which is a subsidiary of Coca-Cola signed a multi-year deal that will make Monster Energy only the third entitlement sponsor (RJ Reynolds/Winston and Sprint/Nextel) in premier series history.

“Monster has built its brand on racing and motorsports, and NASCAR is the pinnacle of motorsports in America,” said Mitch Covington, vice president of sports marketing at Monster Beverage Company. “It's American racing; we're an American brand that's a global company, and NASCAR is, too. When the opportunity came along to further associate yourself with a sport like NASCAR, it was the perfect fit for us. ... NASCAR is just a hard-hitting, close-racing, fun property to be associated with.”

According to some racing analysts, the deal might help bring in a younger group of people.

Monster Energy has existing sponsorships with a number of motorsports sanctioning bodies, athletes and teams, including Kyle Busch, but the new deal signals the biggest sponsorship step in the company's history.

“We have the good fortune of finding a brand that we believe works for our sport,” NASCAR executive vice-president Steve Phelps said. “They're going to bring their lifestyle to their activation. ... They're going to bring their brand, their excitement, their energy to this partnership, and the fans are going to be the winners. It's all about engaging the fans and having the fans have unique, fun experiences whether at the race track or through different mediums, through social, digital, content.”
Along with naming rights to NASCAR's top series, Monster Energy will also hold race sponsorship to the NASCAR All-Star Race and become the Official Energy Drink of NASCAR. Monster Energy also said it will continue to sponsor Stewart-Haas Racing's No. 41 Ford of Kurt Busch.
Phelps said a number of ancillary details will be announced in the coming weeks. Among those still under discussion is the name of the series, the series mark and the championship trophy. Under the agreement, energy drink sponsors already involved in NASCAR may remain in place. Potential sponsors from the energy drink category will not be eligible for future sponsorship if not already involved in the sport.

“But we're very confident that this is the right partner for us, and we're looking forward to having some fun with it,” continued France. “By the way, we're in the fun business. We're racing cars. We're crowning champions. This is where people come to have fun, right? At our speedways and television, what better brand to have associated with us than the people who understand that.”

EARNHARDT VOTED MOST POPULAR

Dale Earnhardt Jr.'s hot streak in Las Vegas continued as he was named the National Motorsports Press Association's Most Popular Driver for the 14th consecutive year.

“That's pretty cool,” Earnhardt said.”This year was a difficult year for us and our team. You think you know just how incredible the NASCAR fans are and how supportive they are. You see them support the drivers through victories and through defeat. But when you go through recovery from an injury or maybe the loss of a loved one or something like that, you really get to the core of what's great about our fan base.”

Earnhardt's 14 consecutive wins mark the longest streak since the award was first presented in 1953. Bill Elliott -- Chase's father -- holds the record for all-time Most Popular Driver honors with 16.

While in Las Vegas for the Sprint Cup Series Awards ceremony in Las Vegas, Earnhardt confirmed that he and fiancée Amy Reimann are set to wed on New Year's Eve.

OTHER RACING NEWS

Ty Dillon will replace Casey Mears at Germain Racing.

Beginning with the 2017 Daytona 500, Dillon will take over full-time driving duties of the No. 13 GEICO Chevrolet in the Sprint Cup Series for Germain Racing. Dillon follows Casey Mears, a seasoned veteran who, over the last six years, has helped build Germain Racing's Cup Series program.

The 24-year old Dillon has made 17 starts in the Sprint Cup Series for several different teams, including Circle Sport/Leavine Family Racing and Stewart-Haas Racing. He scored a career-best sixth-place finish at Talladega Superspeedway in May 2016 while serving as a relief driver for Tony Stewart. Germain Racing notched two Truck Series Championships and two top-10 finishes in the Xfinity Series before making the jump to the nation's top racing series.

Clint Bowyer is suing HScott Motorsports, his former racing team.

Less than a week after finishing the 2016 Sprint Cup season with HScott Motorsports, Clint Bowyer sued the team for at least $2.223 million, alleging it missed two monthly payments and a commission for bringing sponsorship to the team.

Bowyer, through his business arm Clint Bowyer Racing Inc., filed the lawsuit for breach of contract and fraud Nov. 21 against team owner Harry Scott and HScott Motorsports in North Carolina Superior Court.

Bowyer alleges in the lawsuit that Scott, who is expected to shut down the Cup team, is using money owed to him to pay other creditors and "repeatedly failed to make the scheduled payments" owed on the 20th of each month. "[Scott and the team] are in financial distress and in negotiations with various creditors to settle substantial debts ... all the while [they] refuse to pay [Bowyer] for services performed," the complaint states.

In the lawsuit, Bowyer alleges that Scott has not paid money owed to him for a total of $1.2 million and that he is also owed at least $1 million from sponsorship of at least five companies, that Bowyer claims he brought to the team.

"We are aware of the lawsuit," HScott Motorsports spokesman Ramsey Poston said. "Obviously we won't speak about the details of the suit, but I can say that overall it is frivolous and capricious.”

Bowyer obtained an order of attachment, which requires Scott to hold on to at least $2.223 million in property while the lawsuit makes its way through court.

 Stewart-Haas has signed Bowyer to drive the No. 14 Chevrolet in 2017.

Racing Trivia Question: What year did Dale Earnhardt win his last NASCAR Cup championship?

Last Week's Question: What year did the Sprint Cup Chase begin? Answer. The original format started in 2004

You may contact the Racing Reporter by e-mail at: hodges@race500.com.