With the glow of the Fayetteville-Manlius cross country national-championship sweep still on everyone’s mind, it was time for the girls indoor track and field season to get underway, and every local side had a reason to feel good at the end of Friday night’s Jack Morse Kickoff Meet at SRC Arena.
F-M picked up 30 points to finish sixth overall, but that trailed Jamesville-DeWitt, who tied Mexico for fourth place with 32 points as East Syracuse-Minoa won a pair of events to rise to ninth place with 25 points.
Christian Brothers Academy added 14 points as Liverpool, with 67 points, edged Cicero-North Syracuse (63 points) to finish on top, exactly mirroring the result from the boys Morse Meet two nights earlier.
J-D hit it big in the first individual race, the 55-meter hurdles, where freshman Alexandra Payne went 9.21 seconds to beat out C-NS’s Brittany House (9.39 seconds) and the field. F-M’s Gwynn Shepardson was fifth in 9.56 seconds.
Payne joined Alexia Carr, Patrece Martin and Mackenzie Maxam as the Red Rams got third place in the 4×200 relay in 1:55.34. J-D also was third in the 4×800 relay, where Elena Haarer, Rachel Fairbanks, Casey Keane and Megan Brown posted a time of 10:32.22.
Natalie Marra gave ESM a victory in the 3,000-meter run, going 10:33.07 to pull away from Baldwinsville’s Maizy Ludden (11:07.16) by more than half a minute, while F-M’s Mackenzie Pierie was third in 11:13.82 and Palmer Madsen finshed eighth.
The Spartans also saw Mia Montgomery win the triple jump, where her best attempt of 35 feet 11 3/4 inches was well clear of C-NS’s Javielle Fanizzi (34’6″), who was second. Martin gave J-D a third-place finish with 33’8 3/4″ as F-M’s Christabel Ezidiegwu (33’1 1/2″) was fourth, to go with her fourth-place high jump clearance of 4’10”.
CBA’s big moment would be authored by junior Anna Schug in the 600-meter dash. Schug, in the featured heat, covered the distance in 1:42.01, more than a full second better than Mexico’s Hunter Gowans (1:43.05), while Haarer (1:45.88) and Fairbanks (1:47.42) were fifth and seventh, respectively, and ESM’s Juilette Miller (1:46.65) was between them in sixth place.
The Hornets saw Megan Menz take second place in the 1,500-meter run in 5:20.76, though it was far back of Kaitlyn Neal (Skaneateles), who won in 4:59.19. CBA’s Kiana Ferguson had a fourth-place time of 44.75 seconds in the 300-meter dash.
F-M’s Savannah Pidkaminy was fifth in the shot put with a toss of 29’8″ as teammate Sophia Jones (27’3 1/2″) was eighth, and then moved over to the pole vault, where clearing 8 feet put her alone in fourth place.
J-D’s quartet of Casey Keane, Addobea Addo, Guine Nabinger and Kaillee Philleo finished sixth in the 4×400 relay in 4:33.82, with CBA (4:33.92) seventh and F-M eighth. The Hornets were also seventh (10:56.80) in the 4×800 relay, while J-D’s Hannah Butler took eighth in the 1,000-meter run.
