November 22, 2024
At this point, they might as well start calling it the Aaron Thomas Award.
We kid, of course, if only to embarrass Coach Thomas more than he already is for the personal accolades his student-athletes helped him achieve this fall.
But when your program is this good over a sustained period of time, the awards are going to pile up.
For the second straight year and for the fifth time in his illustrious career, Coach Thomas has been named the Iowa Association of Track Coaches (IATC) Class 3A Cross Country Coach of the Year. The award winners were announced earlier this week.
Coach Thomas again lauded his runners for what they accomplished throughout the fall campaign, and said it was their work, not his own, that brought this award to his doorstep yet again.
“This recognition belongs to the team and what (it) did throughout the season,” Coach Thomas said. “The way they handled the expectations of the season and the way they ran at the state meet was truly impressive. To me, this honor is simply a reflection of what they did.”
The Tigers lived up to the preseason hype surrounding them and then some. Coming off a 3A state crown in 2023, Gilbert opened the 2024 season as the No. 1-ranked team in the class and the overwhelming favorite to repeat.
As it turned out, there was so much hype for a reason.
The Tigers barreled through the regular season unbeaten and then put up a perfect score at a 3A State Qualifying Meet in mid-October.
After that is when they really turned it on.
At the state meet in Fort Dodge, Gilbert placed three runners in the top six, four in the top 12, and all five scorers in the top 16 en route to a 3A-record score of 33 points and the program’s fifth state championship in the past 11 seasons. The point total was also the lowest in state-meet history since cross country expanded to four classes two decades ago.
Second-place Des Moines Christian finished 55 points behind the Tigers.
Coach Thomas and the Tigers will surely enter the 2025 season as the odds on favorite to win a third consecutive state crown as well. Five of the team’s state-meet runners will return, including two-time all-staters Logan Bleich, Jacob Tallman, and Carson Squiers.
Coach Thomas has led his Gilbert teams to state 13 times in all. In addition to the five state team titles, the Tigers have also finished as the state runner-up twice.
Coach Thomas has coached 19 individuals to top-10 state-meet finishes, including one state title (Thomas Pollard) and two silver-medal runs.
In addition to the five IATC honors, Coach Thomas has twice been named the Iowa boys cross country Coach of the Year by the U.S. Track & Field and Cross Country Coaches Association.
Coach Thomas, congratulations on this latest well-deserved honor. You truly are an icon in the sport.
