Boys athlete of the year: CVU's Tyler Marshall

The summer before his freshman year of high school, Tyler Marshall had a decision to make: Try out for the soccer team or join his brother and take a stab at cross-country running.

Marshall opted for the latter and, in his first major varsity race, the premier Essex Invitational, finished 14th out of 77 competitors — by far the top freshman harrier.

“I wasn’t expecting that. That was a good kick-starter for the rest of my career,” Marshall said. “I started to like it more as I trained.”

And it foreshadowed what was on the horizon for the Champlain Valley Union star.

First-place medals, individual titles, records — Marshall reached plenty of goals over his four years in his Redhawk singlet, capped by a senior campaign that included state, regional and national recognition.

Marshall defended his Division I cross-country crown in one of the fastest state-meet times in recent memory, placed fourth at New Englands and third at Northeast Regionals to qualify for Nike Cross Nationals, and then in outdoor track set blistering times in record fashion during a tour de force spring.

“He’s got to be in the conversation as one of Vermont’s best high school distance runners ever,” CVU coach Scott Bliss said. “Where he is, that’s debatable.”

Marshall’s standing among the state’s running greats is a topic for another day. But pairing his running exploits in the fall and spring with a standout Nordic skiing season and Marshall earns another deserving title: the Burlington Free Press’ boys athlete of the year.

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Related:CVU’s Marshall scorches 1,500 state record

“Looking back, now that it’s over, I can take the accomplishments and be happy with them,” Marshall said. “Before it was on to the next race and the one after that. Now, there is no more and I can just look back.”

In Nordic, Marshall seized fourth in freestyle and fifth in classic, and anchored both of CVU’s victorious relays, to help the Redhawks return to the top at the Division I championships in February.

Not bad for a sport Marshall uses for cross-training.

“For him, Nordic is a means of staying in shape for running,” CVU Nordic coach Sarah Strack said. “I don’t think Tyler saw himself as a Nordic skier, yet he’s so successful with it.”

Strack recalled Marshall’s relay leg in the freestyle race — which clinched the title for CVU — as one of his best runs.

“He was not 100 percent healthy and he just pulled it out. I watched him gut it out,” Strack said. “Watching him ski, he is a true athlete. He just skied fantastic.”

In the fall, Marshall broke the course record at the NVAC Metro championships in Swanton in 15 minutes, 24.2 seconds, also his personal-best time for a five-kilometer course, and then toured Thetford’s hilly terrain in 16:13.9 for a 41-second triumph in a title repeat.

Marshall’s lone defeat on Vermont soil over the 2016-17 school year — cross-country or track — came at Thetford’s Woods Trail Run, where he lost out in a photo finish (16:09.03) to Drew Thompson of Fairfield, Connecticut.

For Bliss, Marshall’s performance at Northeast Regionals in Wappingers Falls, New York, was a cut above. Against a field that included not just New England’s best but a mix of standouts from Pennsylvania and New Jersey, Marshall was fearless in racing to third place and earning an automatic spot to the national meet in Oregon.

“Bowdoin Park is really hard, basically a mile and a half uphill, then screaming downhill, some rollers,” Bliss said. “He went out and stuck his nose with the best guys and he just stayed there. That’s his toughness, fight, desire — all those things were put into play in that one race.”

In a pack or running solo, Marshall learned to run for place and for time. Take outdoor track, where Marshall faced little resistance in his assault on the middle-distance records.

After building up again following the Nordic season, Marshall started to hit his goals in early May. At the Burlington Invitational, Marshall broke the overall state mark in the 1,500 (3:56.18) by over a second. The second-place runner, Danville’s Riley Fenoff, finished 11 seconds back.

Marshall went on to set the 3,000 D-I record (8:36.89), chased down the 1,500-800-3,000 triple at the state meet for the second straight year and earned runner-up honors at New Englands in the 1,600 (4:14.62).

“He wanted to break a state record and we’ve been trying, but it’s really hard when you are doing that on your own,” Bliss said. “That’s one of the things I think I love about his season, running as fast as he did and breaking records that have been around a little while at least and not having anyone really pushing him.

“He didn’t make a mistake all year. He was the guy every single time he raced.”

In his final high school competition, Marshall opted to run the 800 at New Englands, just 90 minutes after medaling in the 1,600. The last-minute decision was news to Bliss.

“I thought he was done and then I saw him warming up,” Bliss said. “But that’s Tyler, he’s a man of few words.”

Marshall let his actions speak, finishing seventh with a school-record time of 1:54.77 — about seventh-tenths of a second away from the overall state record.

“One of the most amazing things about Tyler is his range. I think he would have broken the state record if he was in the fast heat,” Bliss said.

Set to continue his running career at the University of Vermont, Marshall has only scratched the surface of his potential, according to Bliss.

“Tyler’s a very humble person and I know he wants to be as good as he can be,” Bliss said. “There is money in the bank. I think he has better things to come.”

Contact Alex Abrami at 660-1848 or aabrami@freepressmedia.com. Follow him on Twitter at www.twitter.com/aabrami5

Boys Athletes of the Year

2017: Tyler Marshall, Champlain Valley

2016: Andy Kenosh, Rutland

2015: Alec Eschholz, Mount Mansfield

2014: Tommy Fitzgerald, Rice

2013: Matt St. Amour, Missisquoi

2012: Matt St. Amour, Missisquoi

2011: Christian McCormick, Rice