Green Hope senior Gabriel Reynolds knows the expectations are high for the boys’ cross country team this fall. Wanting to be sure to do his part, he recently upped his weekly training mileage from 40 miles over seven days to 45 over six.

“I didn’t want [my teammates] to think I wasn’t taking it as seriously,” Reynolds said.

With six of their top seven runners returning from last year’s team, which finished third in the state, the Falcons expect to be serious contenders for the NCHSAA 4-A state championship this fall. Spurred by coming so close last year plus the knowledge that almost the entire team is back, the Falcons are leaving nothing to chance.

For the last several weeks, Zak Roshdy, Doug Black, Scott Hefner, Bryan Spreitzer, Ryan Walling and Reynolds have gathered on their own for training runs at Bond Park, working on their individual times while also working on running as a pack.

“Our chemistry over the summer, being able to run with each other, has definitely helped us to bond as a team and become a stronger team,” Hefner said.

That the Falcons have become stronger is a startling concept. Roshdy, Black and Walling finished 13th, 14th and 16th, respectively, in the state last year, and Green Hope was the only team to place three runners in the top 20.

But that wasn’t enough to get the Falcons, winners of the last six Tri-Eight Conference championships, their first state title. With about three-quarters of a mile to go at Tanglewood Park, a runner stepped off the course because of an injury, taking his likely top 30 finish with him. Having to go back to their sixth runner to round out the team score dropped the Falcons to third.

“I think about it almost every time I come out and run,” Black said. “You want to push yourself because you don’t want something to happen like last year at states.”

The Falcons had a strong showing a few weeks later at the Nike Team Nationals Southeast Regional in Hoover, Ala. The Falcons finished eighth in the 17-team field. Walling, Spreitzer, Roshdy, Black and Hefner finished within 37 seconds of each other and their times ranged from 16:57.5 to 17:34.9.

“I feel like I’m with these guys so much, you can really count on them when it’s time to race,” Black said. “And that helps us all be more confident.”

While Broughton and Enloe, the two teams that finished ahead of Green Hope at the state championships, return equally loaded this fall, the Falcons demonstrated they were a contender when they beat them both and won the Mideast Regional title the week before last year’s state meet.

Green Hope won’t have to wait until the end of the season for a test. In addition to the mid-week dual meets, the Falcons are scheduled to run in five weekend invitationals. Coach Mike Miragliuolo expects those races will prepare them for the season’s final one.

“For us, there’s still a lot of excitement to see if we can do it,” Miragliuolo said. “It’d be one thing if we were cocky and thought we had something guaranteed to us, but we know we’ve been close and haven’t had it. There is a little bit of hunger there driving them. You know you’re so close before and you can’t take anything for granted.”