Tyler Haab ’14, Moose Recktenwald ’14: The Episcopal boys cross-country team has been competing strongly this season, looking forward to EA/Haverford glory for, what would be, the 11th time in a row, under Coach Jim Farrell. It therefore comes as no surprise that this month, Scholium has decided to give the Boy’s Athlete of the Month honor to none other than the consistent first place runner, captain of the cross-country squad, Steven Lucey ’13.
Going into his freshman year, Lucey choose to run cross-country because, “[He] felt the need to do a sport during [his] first season at Episcopal Academy and [he] honestly just thought it wouldn’t be too hard.” He soon realized the physical and mental challenges the sport brings, as he could not pace himself and had trouble finding success.
Lucey stated, “I could not pace myself and found myself running and stopping repeatedly during races. I never completely lost this bad habit until my junior year. Once I gained experience and learned to pace myself, I started to enjoy cross-country and saw my times drop.”
Lucey attributes his success to Coach Farrell, who has been the boy’s cross-country coach for 11 years. He believes that Farrell’s leadership and organization is what “allows the team to excel” and has made him the leader he has become. The dynamic leadership of the senior co-captains, Lucey and Daniel McCormick ’13, and Coach Farrell has led the cross-country team to a record of 3-2 in the Inter-Ac. Lucey, a four-year varsity member, noted, “We were pretty happy with our performance in Inter-Acs. We accomplished most of our goals, despite the bad weather. I finished all league which was awesome.” Lucey finished 8th in the competition leading his team to 4th overall. As Lucey told Scholium, “Haverford finished 5th, but score wise we beat them by a pretty big margin.” He believes his team will be able to produce the same results on EA/Haverford Day as long as they keep working hard.
When we interviewed some of Lucey’s teammates, they all had nothing but positive remarks to give about their captain.
Jay Kelly ’14 remarked, “His leadership and motivation are some of the aspects that allow the team to excel and get better. I have no doubt Lucey will keep us working hard in the next couple weeks before the big day.”
Lucey continues to finish as the top runner for Episcopal in each and every race. With his best time of 16 minutes 45 seconds on the five kilometer Episcopal course, Lucey also finished 8th in the Briarwood Invitational.
When asked about his own personal goals, Lucey explained, “I never run to win, I just run to improve upon my last time.”
Lucey believes that “success comes from hard work.”
“His determination motivates the rest of the team,” remarked William Langfitt ’14.
Lucey’s greatest achievements thus far in the season include a second place finish at the Frank McAlpin Invitational and a strong performance in the dual meet versus Haverford where Lucey won the race leading the team to a one-point victory over the Fords.
Lucey finally added, “This year, if we win versus Haverford in cross-country, will make it the 11th year in a row. Some people just automatically count on us for the win [against Haverford’s cross-country team] but we still need strong support from the student body so I hope people can make it out to our run the morning of the 10th!”

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