Up against a new set of competitors, the Marcellus boys cross country team found a new degree of success – and earned the Onondaga High School League Freedom division championship.
During Wednesday afternoon’s rain-soaked OHSL Freedom meet at East Syracuse-Minoa, the Mustangs upended regular-season champion Jamesville-DeWitt, scoring 66 points to the Red Rams’ 78. Chittenango, with 82 points, took third place.
As he had done throughout the fall, junior Pat McGuane led the way for Marcellus, making it through ESM’s Pine Grove course in 16 minutes, 50.7 seconds, third behind J-D’s Patrick Dye (16:32.6) and just one second behind Mexico’s Jake Zedack (16:49.7).
Senior Alex Stopen gained ninth place, in 17:43.6, while freshman Ethan Mosure earned 15th place in 18:17.5. Sophomore Andrew Marsh was 18th in 18:24.1.
But it was another ninth-grader, Joe Riccardi, making it to 21st place in 18:29.8 that clinched the league title. Right behind him, Riley Burns (18:38.7), Steve Larison (18:43.2), Justin Schoeneck (19:10.9), Sean Raymond (19:20.8), Aaron Otis (19:25.8) and Kevin Brown (19:37.8) all had strong showings.
In the girls portion of the OHSL Liberty meet, Marcellus finished fifth out of seven teams with 107 points as J-D (52 points) did finish on top here, with Homer (72 points) the runner-up.
As ESM’s Natalie Marra won in a time of 19:37 flat on her home course, senior Emily Townsend led the Mustangs’ efforts, getting to 13th place in a clocking of 22:07.9.
Schuyler Stuart gained 20th place, in 22:39.4, while Tori Stopen made it to 22nd place in 22:45.5. Crystal Silliman finished 26th in 23:08.8 as Dominique Weeks, in 34th place (23:46.0) rounded out the scoring column, just ahead of Morgan Gould (24:05.3), Hanna Burns (24:12.0) and Brianna Szczech (24:14.7).
Meanwhile, OHSL Liberty regular-season action wrapped up, with Jordan-Elbridge, who will host the league championship meet, beating Hannibal 25-30 in boys action.
Nathan Hollis finished second in a time of 16:41 behind the Warriors’ Jason McFarland (15:45), while Hunter Brunell edged out Austin Milton for third place, each finishing in 17:13. Tyler Jackson made his way to sixth place in 17:33 as Jared Alpha, finishing 10th in 18:05, clinched the Eagles’ win.
