AUGUSTA – Lisbon High School’s boys and Monmouth Academy’s girls heard footsteps Saturday morning. Loud ones, sloshing through the leftover puddles on a University of Maine at Augusta course ravaged by Friday’s torrential rain.

Let the record show that it’s easier to shadow the reigning kings and queens of Mountain Valley Conference cross country than it is to overtake them.

Two sensational streaks survived for another year, with the Greyhounds winning their fifth consecutive MVC boys’ title and the Mustangs making it six straight girls’ championships.

Led by captain Aaron Cloutier, Lisbon finished fourth, fifth, seventh, ninth and 12th to overcome the two-three finish of Winthrop senior speedsters Danny Soltan and Tor O’Brien. The Greyhounds’ total of 37 points was four better than the Ramblers, who fell just shy of their first MVC title since 1983.

“We’ve been back and forth with them. We really edged them today. Four points, that’s not a whopping margin. It can go either way next week and the week after,” said Lisbon coach Hank Fuller, alluding to the upcoming Class C regional and state meets.

Lisbon is also the four-time reigning state champion.

Monmouth hoisted its last state trophy in now-defunct Class D in 1999, but the Mustangs have dominated their larger league rivals in the current decade.

This time, it took top-flight runs by Kerstin Grenier (second, 22:01), Melanie McInnis (fourth, 22:50) and Kristin Freeman (sixth, 23:02) and stellar mid-pack showings from Devon Ayer and Maija Robbins to gain the edge in a frantic, four-team battle. Monmouth (59 points) nosed out Lisbon (66), Hall-Dale (69) and Madison (72).

“We broke a record, I think,” Grenier said. “This means so much. It motivates us.”

“It’s just a tremendous amount of pride. We’re a small school, and we’ve graduated kids year after year who were leaders,” said Monmouth coach Rick Amero. “The kids can view it as pressure or they can view it as pride, and it’s tradition for them right now. It gives them an added step to keep that going.”

Hall-Dale swept the individual titles. Magen Ellis finished a full minute and 17 seconds ahead of Grenier. Wade Davis (17:15) topped Soltan by 10 seconds and O’Brien by 30 along the hilly, five-kilometer layout.

Cloutier (18:11) and Ethan Masselli (fifth, 18:33) held up their half of the bargain for the Greyhounds by keeping Winthrop’s deft duo in sight.

Roughly another half-minute back, Rob Patchell, Alex Branson and Nick Jones clustered themselves to hold the Ramblers’ supporting cast of Pat Romar, Justin Carpenter, Kevin Leavitt and Alex Cottrell at bay.

“We just had to get more kids in before they got in their three and four,” Cloutier said. “I tried before the race to get everybody going so they knew what they had to do.”

This was Lisbon and Winthrop’s third head-to-head meeting in the last two weeks, each in a different setting with varying levels of competition.

Winthrop won the upper hand at Belfast’s Festival of Champions on Sept. 29. Lisbon evened the score in a regular-season meet on its home course.

“This is a good wake-up call,” Soltan said. “We have two more chances.”

Monmouth finished third with 74 points. Matt McCollett and Kevin Desmond set the pace in sixth and eighth, respectively.

Ayer’s finish of 21st provided unexpected points for the Monmouth girls.

“She’s been running fifth or sixth for the team, and today she finished fourth for the team and beat out some key Hall-Dale and Lisbon kids,” said Amero. “But not by much. It was a wonderful meet.”

Lisbon’s top female runner, Kelly Bourgoin, missed the race due to illness. Amanda Lamb (seventh, 23:07) and Kayla Moan (ninth, 23:23) provided a lift for the Greyhounds, who placed all five of their scorers among the top 18 and nearly pulled off the sweep.

“Monmouth is a classy, accomplished program. They’re always ready for big meets,” Fuller said. “If people look at our boys the way I admire Monmouth’s team, I would take that as a feather in our collective cap.”