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A handful of individuals and two area teams will be searching for state championship gold when they journey to Cabell Midland High School for the state cross country meet on Saturday.

Elkins High School's Letitia Propst will be chasing an amazing third-straight Class AAA state championship at the meet.

Propst, who missed her first four races this season with a knee injury, won every race she competed in this season. The junior runner advanced to the state meet after winning the regional title last week at Davis & Elkins College.

"Leitia was injured for almost half of this season and is still not back to the same level she was last year," said Elkins coach Matt Lewis. "She will have to have her best performance of the season if she want to win another state title because there's going to be some tough competition."

Another area regional champion, Philip Barbour's Sarah McCauley, will be a favorite to compete for a state title in Class A-AA. McCauley, who won the regional championship last week in Berkeley Springs, finished third at the state meet last season as a sophomore.

McCauley will be joined by teammate Brianna Waybright, who was sixth at the regionals.

Also on the girls side, Buckhannon-Upshur will send its entire unit to the meet after a finishing second in the regionals last week.

Shaina Kopelov, Stephanie Barlow, Reba Cutright, Casey Thorpe, Caitlin Warner, Liana Kopelov and Casey Orsburn make up the Lady Bucs' team.

In the boys' competition, Elkins will be represented by its entire team after finishing third at the regional meet.

The Tigers will be led by Ben Proudfoot, who also qualified as an individual with a seventh place finish at regionals.

Zach Burnside, Dylan Lewis, Corey DeVall, Nathaniel Simmons, James White and Karl Smakula make up the rest of the EHS?unit.

The Philip Barbour will send three individuals to the state meet as Riley Freeman, Chris Toompas and Charles Anderson all qualified last week.

Buckhannon-Upshur's Justin Miller and Tucker County's David Rhodes will also run in the individual competition.

Rhodes finished fourth at the state meet last season.

Meet Schedule: Class AAA girls - 10 a.m.; Class AAA boys -10:45 a.m.; Class AA-A girls - 12:45 p.m.; Class AA-A boys - 1:30 p.m.