Each of the Baldwinsville track and field teams were quite impressive in their three-team SCAC Metro division meet at Fayetteville-Manlius last Wednesday afternoon that also featured West Genesee.
In the boys meet, B’ville defeated the Hornets 88-53, while also topping the Wildcats 96-54, mostly on the basis of garnering plenty of second and third-place finishes to pile up points.
But there was some individual glory, too, whether it was Nick Kruger unleashing a triple jump of 41 feet 3 inches or Owen Weaver going 19’6 ¾” in the long jump.
On the track, Sam Kellner was first in the 400-meter hurdles in 1:01.87, while Connor Waldron took the 400-meter dash in 53.04 seconds. Kellner, Michael Lawrence, Jon Formoza and Garrett Vannatta were first in the 4×800 relay in 8:19.60 as Kruger joined Formoza, Lawrence and Waldron to win the 4×400 relay in 3:35.68.
For the B’ville girls, Justus Holden-Betts and Lauren Addario each won twice, with Holden-Betts holding off F-M’s great distance runners as she took the 1,500-meter run in 5:09.13 and also claimed the 400 hurdles in 1:10.22.
Addario needed 13.04 seconds to beat the field in the 100 sprint and went on to record a first-place triple jump of 36’10 ½”, also pairing with Holden-Betts, Courtney Clute and Olivia Creelman to win the 4×400 relay in 4:25.71.
Karen Ekure claimed the high jump, clearing 4’10”, with Ella Smith topping 7 feet in the pole vault. Alexandra Bednarczyk threw the shot put 26’9” and Jenna Wallace won the discus, heaving it 93’3 ½”.
Two days later, B’ville would go head-to-head with most of its area large-school rivals as they battled for top honors during the Chittenango Invitational.
The boys Bees had 72.87 points, second only to Liverpool (94.87 points), while in the girls meet B’ville had 61.5 points, putting them in third place behind Liverpool (107 points) and F-M (66.2 points).
Prevailing in the boys 4×400, B’ville’s quartet of Waldron, Formoza, Owen Weaver and Anthony Delveccchio went 3:44.90 to pull far away from runner-up Chittenango’s 3:53.92. The Bees were also third in the 4×800 in 9:14.36.
Weaver, clearing 5 feet, tied four others for the top spot in the high jump, and also finished fourth in the triple jump, going 38’11”. Jack Michaels won the full-field mile, his time of 4:44.87 nearly three seconds ahead of Liverpool’s T.J. Praschunus (4:47.86).
Sam Mellinger, Malik Davis, Robert Thompson and Mike Letizia made it to third place in the 4×100 relay in 46.21 seconds. Lawrence was second in the 400 sprint in 52.97 seconds, with Waldron third in 53.28 seconds as Kellner took second in the 800 in 2:02.22 and Vannatta (2:06.31) was sixth.
In the boys five-event pentathlon, Kruger grabbed third place with 2,500 points. Colin Delaney was fifth in the 3,000-meter steeplechase in 10:43.05, while Steven Miller was fifth in the discus (125’8”) and Letizia was seventh in the 100 in 11.62 seconds.
On the girls side, Justus Holden-Betts, with a time of 1:08.76, was second to South Jefferson’s Marlena Jacobs (1:07.60) in the 400 hurdles, with Creelman sixth in 1:16.90. Earlier, Holden-Betts needed 7:28.10 to finish third in the 2,000-meter steeplechase.
Ekure, with a time of 12.83 seconds in the 100 sprint, was second to Liverpool’s Haven Hicks (12.72), Ekure also heping the Bees get fifth place in the 4×100 in 53.57 seconds. Ekure and Megan Brecht tied for third in the high jump, clearing 4’4”.
Allyson Surowick, with a long jump of 15’10 ½”, got second place to Liverpool’s Marissa Baskin (16’6”) Sarah Fawwaz, Sage Springsteen, Claire Walker and Vivian Holden-Betts were second in the 4×800, while Ella Smith cleared 8 feet in the pole vault, tying for fourth place.
Wallace had a third-place discus throw of 100’10” and was sixth in the shot put. Anna Conklin got fifth place in the full-field mile in 5:52.92 and was seventh in the 800 Catherine Iven was fifth in the pentathlon, earning 1,819 points.
