By: Sean Moylan Sports Writer
After all the results were tallied following Sunday’s NJSIAA Group III Cross Country Championships at Holmdel Park, Northern Burlington County Regional High senior cross country star Mike Bowden missed qualifying for a wild card spot at the Meet of Champions by just one place.
Daniel Fitzgerald from Kingsway edged out Bowden for the final wild card spot. Fitzgerald ran a 16:56 time to place 16th overall in Group III while Bowden took 17th place with a 16:59 time.
“Mike knows he could have run a little better, but he didn’t run a bad race,” said NBC head varsity cross country coach Steve Alustiza, whose senior star had already beaten Fitzgerald in a big weekend race earlier in the year. “If Mike had beaten Fitzgerald, it would have been Mike going to the Meet of Champions.”
An exceptional student-athlete, Bowden has already been accepted at LaSalle University, but he is still weighing his many college options.
This year the NBC boys also qualified as a team for States for the first time in Alustiza’s 25-year career coaching the squad. This season Group III is even better than Group IV. Consequently, Alustiza knew his Greyhounds’ chances of moving on as a team on Sunday were very limited.
Nevertheless, NBC, with 372 points, did place 16th out of the 20 Group III teams competing on Sunday. West Windsor-Plainsboro North walked away with the Group III team title with 42 points.
“We were in a tough bracket. We had five of the Top 10 teams in New Jersey in our bracket. So I’m not disappointed in my team at all. I’ll take them to battle any time,” Alustiza said.
NBC junior Ryan Ramirez returned from a long-planned family vacation just in time to run the Greyhounds’ second best time on Sunday. Ramirez placed 50th with a time of 17:51. A tireless worker, Ramirez worked out on the cruise ship last week just to stay fit. He’s a very dedicated young man.
“He (Ramirez) ran okay for being away,” said Alustiza. “Next year, Ryan doesn’t have to do Bowden times. He just has to get stronger.”
NBC’s other finishers in Sunday’s race were junior Dylan Kurowsky (68th place with an 18:14 time), sophomore Andre Dupuis (90th place with a 18:29 time), junior Jordan Andrade (119th place with a 19:13 time), senior Jon Grossman (120th place with a 19:16 time) and junior Jerry Pham (135th place with a 20:17 time).
Despite the bad weather, a few members of the NBC girls’ varsity cross country team even showed up at Holmdel Park on Sunday to cheer on the boys, which Alustiza really appreciated.
“Besides losing Mike (Bowden) and Jon (Grossman), we’ll have the same nucleus back next year. They want to come back and qualify for States as a team again,” said Alustiza, who’ll miss Bowden very much.
“Over the last four years, Mike has been our stud. But he’s going to take a short break and then he’s going to do winter and spring track.”
Alustiza has a lot of faith in this group, which posted a 14-2 record and may have been NBC’s best boys’ varsity cross country team ever. Moreover, he believes that Ramirez can have a great senior year.
“I think he (Ramirez) will be our very strong number one runner. But will he be as good as Mike was? I don’t know,” said Alustiza.
Runners as good as Mike Bowden usually only come around only once every generation or so.

