It’s shaping up as one of the biggest regular-season cross country meets in recent memory.
At Long Branch Park on Wednesday, Fayetteville-Manlius would face Liverpool, with the girls Hornets in the rare position of looking up the state Class A rankings as it was no. 3 and the Warriors were in the top spot.
As if that wasn’t enough, there is the boys race where the opposite holds true – F-M is no. 1 in the state rankings and Liverpool is no. 3, creating another highly-anticipated showdown.
Before this took place, though, Liverpool had to withstand a challenge from Baldwinsville last Wednesday afternoon at Long Branch, and did so with relative ease.
The girls Warriors’ 15-46 win over the state no. 16-ranked Bees (plus a 15-50 win over Syracuse West) included Jenna Schulz tearing to victory in 18 minutes, eight seconds, well clear of Madison Neuner, who was second in 18:47.
Liverpool swept the top four as Sydney Carlson, third in 19:15, and Windsor Ardner, fourth in 19:26, topped the Bees’ quick time of 19:50 from Justus Holden-Betts.
Then Emily Neuner gained sixth place in 19:54 to round out Liverpool’s scoring column, though Gabrielle McCarthy (20:36), Bella Brancato (20:53) and Rosie Petrella (21:26) also reached the top 10.
It wasn’t much different in the boys meet, Liverpool turning back state no. 14-ranked B’ville 16-43 and handling Syracuse West 15-50 behind another top-four sweep led by Nathan Reeves, whose 16:22 beat Carter Rodriguez (16:26) by four seconds.
Jake McGowan was third in 16:34 as he and Spencer Ruediger (16:39) each topped the 16:46 from B’ville’s Adam Davis. Then Nick Brancato finished sixth in 16:47 as T.J. Praschunus finished eighth in 17:17.
Ironically, the battle with F-M would come after Cicero-North Syracuse faced them first, the meet taking place last Tuesday as the Northstars lost 16-45 on the girls side and 15-48 on the boys side.
Kate Putman, who not far from this location won the East Syracuse Minoa Invitational three days earlier on Sept. 15, finished fifth in this race in 19:55.
No one could catch F-M’s Claire Walters in the girls race as she finished in 18:41, more than half a minute ahead of Grace Kaercher’s 19:19. Hannah Kaercher was third in 19:45 as Phoebe White was fourth in 19:51 to beat out Putman. Allison Newton, seventh in 20:36, was C-NS’s only other top-10 finisher.
The boys Northstars saw F-M sweep the top five, led by Matt Tripp, who in 17:06.9 edged Sam Otis and Geoff Howles (17:02.2) for the top spot.
Nathan Poirier had C-NS’s best performance, getting to sixth place in 17:19.5. R.J. Davis also ran well, taking ninth place in 17:38.5 to hold off Matt LeClair (17:38.9) for that spot.
From there, it was on to compete in Saturday’s 67th annual Baldwinsville Invitational, where the C-NS girls managed to win the Large School division title with 71 points to 92 for the hosts from B’ville.
This happened even though Putman, with a time of 17:48.1, was second in the individual race behind the Bees’ Justus Holden-Betts, who won in 17:34.5.
Newton ran a superb race, getting to sixth place in 18:29.3. Then eighth-grader Hannah Navarra finished 14th in 19:03.7 as Maria Marullo got 16th place in 19:17 flat, with Sarah Davis clinching the win by taking 33rd place in 19:56.4. Riley Barrett (20:17.0) and Abbee Norris (20:49.0) followed with top-50 efforts.
Meanwhile, the C-NS boys were fifth in its Large School race at B’ville as Poirier was 16th in 15:57.5 and Davis was 17th in 16:03 flat. LeClair got 10th place in 16:16.8 as Lucas Sharron was 33rd in 16:27.6 and Christian Carlin, in 16:58.1, beat out Brad Laquidari (16:58.7) and Evan Breitbeck (17:10.8).
Liverpool was at B’ville, too, though its top runners did not compete.
On the boys side, Ethan Glashauser finished 36th in 16:36 flat, just ahead of Dawson Newbern (16:38.6) as Cameron O’Connell (16:47.9) was two spots ahead of Ryan Cartwright (16:48.9).
Petrella led the girls Warriors to a ninth-place finish as she posted a time of 19:46.7 to finish 25th in the team standings, edging out Eva Woodworth, who was 26th in 19:47.4. Claudia Brown (20:07.8) and Kaleigh Buck (21:02.9) also had top-50 finishes.
