5. Maya Messenger - Ocean Springs High School
- Last Ranking: NR
- Last Performance: 19:09 5k, 9th place finish at the 2021 Watson Invitational
- Next Race: MHSAA Southern Regional Championships
One of the newcomers on this list, coming in at #5 and HUGE jump up onto the rankings with her run at Watson is Maya Messenger of Ocean Springs! Messenger literally had the race of her life at Watson with a HUGE PR, and an even bigger SB. After not running under 20:30 all season, Messenger came out to Choctaw Trails and went 19:09 AND a Top-10 finish in the deepest field Mississippi has ever seen. Even better... she's just a freshman!! Messenger hopped onto the MHSAA 6A scene in a huge way, as she beat one of the 6A title favorites in that race and was only 8 seconds behind another 6A title favorite. What a day for Messenger, and I can't to see what she has in store for us the remainder of her season.
4. Ella Rankin - Hartfield Academy
- Last Ranking: NR
- Last Performance: 19:01 5k, 7th place finish at the 2021 Watson High School Meet
- Next Race: MSAIS Overall Championships
This is easily the biggest surprise to me in the whole entire list. I remember writing a JH runners article about how she has impressed me already this year, but I had no idea that she was going to do this on Saturday...
Coming at a strong #4 is the 8th grader from Hartfield Academy, Ella Rankin. Let me repeat that... She just ran a 19:00 5k in the 8TH GRADE! That is the third fastest time ever run by an 8th grader, behind only Kate Mattox and Brooklyn Biancamano, and that is some great company to be in. Perhaps even more impressive, this was over a 2 minute SB as well as a 57 second PR in just her 3rd race of the season. She went from running 2 miles at 6:20 per mile pace just 12 days prior at the Kirk Academy Invitational to a 5k in 6:07 per mile pace. I simply can't type enough on how wildly impressive her performance was on Saturday. Expect her to be chasing the sub-19 5k barrier for the remainder of the season.