It was breakthrough invite Saturday morning for Arcadia's Megan Reniewicki and Catalina Foothills Sam Pershing as the cross country standouts notched first-place finishes for the first time this season at the 27th annual Ojo Rojo Invite at Tumbleweed Park in Chandler.

Reniewicki, a senior, competed in her third invitational this season and climbed the ladder to the top with her finish. She finished third earlier this month at the Peaks Invite in Flagstaff and was second last week at Desert Solstice in Tucson. Reniewicki had plenty of breathing room in winning, covering the course layout in 18 minutes, 14 seconds. That was eight seconds ahead of runner-up Alexis Nichols of Chandler.

"It was a good race for me," Reniewicki said. "I got out fast and ran pretty well on the flat course. My goal is to get my times solidly in the 17's (minutes). I felt good, but it was a little warm."

Race time was moved up by about a half an hour over the last several years as heat has become a factor affecting too many runners. The earlier start time seemed to help. Reniewicki placed third at state last season in Division II and of course is looking to improve her finish by a couple spots come November.

While Reniewicki was in the spotlight individually, host school Chandler High left no doubt as to who the top girls team was in the 32-school field. Chandler totaled 27 points with finishes of second (senior Alexis Nichols), third (freshman Morgan Foster), fifth (freshman Becca Taylor), eighth (sophomore Ava Hamilton) and ninth junior Gabrielle Enns) to unseat defending champ Catalina Foothills. Chandler placed a sixth runner at 10 and its seventh at 35. Nichols won the senior race two weeks ago at the Chandler Invite and Hamilton won the sophomore race there as well. Corona del Sol was second in the team compeitition (82 points) followed by Catalina Foothills, Mesquite and Arcadia.

Pershing was able to escape the shadow of Buena standout Manuel Olivo-Quinones, who outdistanced Pershing in the other two meets Pershing competed in (Sue Fletcher and Desert Solstice). Pershing, a junior, was a solid second in both those invites, but an average 24 seconds behind Olivo-Quinones. Olivo-Quinones has the fastest time in the state so far in 2015. Pershing's clocking at Ojo Rojo was 16:11.

"My plan was to stay with the top pack for two and a half miles and have the burst of energy for the last 800 meters," Pershing said. "It's nice to win after chasing Manuel the last couple of meets. He's really good. I felt I ran my race today."

Pershing was 29th at state last year (D-II) and ready to settle for anything less than going for first this year. He won't have to contend with Olivo-Quinones at state since Buena competes in D-I, but there will be plenty of other challengers.

In the team-title competition Corona del Sol successfully defended its boys title for the fourth consecutive year totaling 38 points. That bested runner-up Shadow Mountain (97), third-place Brophy (119), fourth-place Gilbert (159) and fifth-place Basha (191).

Corona's top five finishers were junior Slade Sumners (second), junior Liam Kovatch (third), sophomore Lincoln Johnson (seventh), senior Lucas Ykema (11th) and sophomore Graham Eversden (15th).