In a four-day stretch, the Cicero-North Syracuse cross country teams would open their respective CNY Counties League National division schedules and also take a tour through the course that will host the Section III championships at the start of November.
First there was the league meet, C-NS facing Central Square and Syracuse East last Wednesday afternoon on the same course where it swept the Red Hawks’ invitational meet on Sept. 6, with the girls Northstars beating both sides by equal 15-50 margins.
Leading a top-five sweep, Taylor Parry won the race in 22 minutes, 8 seconds, beating out Megan Trubia, with Jilliann Norris one second behind them in third place.
Madison Gross got to fourth place, in 22:47, crossing the line just ahead of Mia Pestle in fifth place. Leading the next pack of Northstars, Hailee Kolakowski, in a time of 23:31, finished eighth, just ahead of Lexi Pirro (23:33) in ninth place and Ashley Irvine (23:43), who was 10th.
It proved a bit closer in the boys meet between C-NS and Central Square, but the Northstars still beat the Red Hawks 23-38, while also handling Syracuse East 18-45.
Andrew Bearkland led the way, his time of 17:49 enough to pull away from Central Square teammates Chad Dunham and Sean Kuehn, who both finished in 17:17.
Behind them, Joe Tricarico, in 18:26, edged out Syracuse East’s top runner, Eric Houck (18:28), for fourth place. Then Chris Hannan, who was sixth in 18:29, led a Northstars quintet that included Jared George (18:35), Jake Dehm (19:02), Allen Garnes (19:14) and Zach Wagner (19:16) in the top 10.
Having taken two tours through Central Square, the Northstars now went somewhere different, competing Saturday in the Vernon-Verona-Sherrill Invitational and winning both of its races in vastly different manners.
The boys Race 3 at VVS evolved into a duel between C-NS and Carthage, and with 54 points, the Northstars edged the Comets (55 points) for the top spot, with Chittenango (89 points) in third place.
After Carthage’s Noah Affolder (16:06.5) and Sam Affolder (16:54.7) went 1-2, C-NS fought back with Bearkland taking fifth place in 17:35.3, with Hannan getting seventh place in 17:48 flat and George (17:56.5) snatching ninth place.
Tricarico followed, putting up a 13th-place time of 18:15.5, but C-NS still needed Garnes to finish 20th in 18:44.9, five places ahead of Carthage’s fifth runner, to pull out the team title. Evan Tracy (18:57.1), Sam Barber (18:58.2) and Dehm (19:06.1) followed Garnes.
By contrast, the girls Northstars dominated Race 3 at VVS, picking up 37 points, well clear of a 12-team field where Newark Valley, with 102 points, lay far back in second place.
Again, Norris led the way, posting a third-place time of 20:42.5, with Parry fifth in 20:53.2 and Trubia landing in seventh place in 21:08.2. Gross, in 21:59.4, slid into 12th place, with Pestle (22:08.1) and Annina Murillo (22:11.2) 16th and 17th, respectively. Pirro was 22nd in 22:49.4, beating out Kolakowski (22:52.1) and Molly Camire (22:54.9) for those spots.
