Though it was, technically, the Onondaga High School League Liberty division championship meet, it turned into a neighborhood contest between Solvay and Westhill last Wednesday night at Manley Field House.
And the Bearcats proved to have the bigger bite, piling up 155 points to beat the Warriors (102 points) and add the league title to the Section III Class B title it claimed a week earlier.
Mike Acchione began a sweep of the sprints when he held off Songtha Cosby by the smallest possible margin, 6.91 seconds to 6.92, in the 55-meter dash.
Greg Manning followed by taking the 300-meter dash in 36.63 seconds as Conor Halton, fifth in that event, won the 55-meter high hurdles in 9.05 seconds as Will Hnatko finished third. Acchione, Cosby, Jeremy Parker and Brian Wright combined to prevail in the 200 freestyle relay in 1:35.62.
Solvay really piled up the points in field events, though. Jason Conners tossed the shot put 52 feet 4 3/4 inches, winning that title as teammate Greg Caloia (37 feet 3 1/2 inches) got fifth place.
Cosby won the long jump, going 19 feet 7 1/4 inches as Chris Hoffman (17 feet 9 1/2 inches) finished second. Acchione went 40 feet 9 3/4 inches to prevail in the triple jump, with Wright (37 feet 1/2 inch) in third place.
Jeremy Parker took first place in the high jump, clearing 5 feet 2 inches. Jeremy Santoferra worked his way to a third in the pole vault as he cleared 10 feet 6 inches.
In longer running events, Parker finished third at 600 meters (1:29.92), as Matt Fedrizzi got third in the 3,200-meter run (10:49.10) and Hnatko got third place in the mile in 4:55.04. Manning ran to fourth place in the 1,000-meter run in 2:45.90.
Westhill went 1-2 in the mile, as Andrew Corcoran won in 4:35.71 and Eric Moore (4:52.13) finished second. Moore had his own moment of triumph in the 3,200-meter run, prevailing in 10:23.10 as Vinny Savastano gained the runner-up spot in 10:27.81.
Corcoran also claimed second in the 1,000 in 2:41.56, as Anthony Legnetto needed 1:29.39 to claim second place in the 600-meter run.
Ryan Files finished second in the 300-meter dash (38.93 seconds), as Pat Niedzwicki needed 7.32 seconds for fourth place in the 55-meter dash. Niedzwiecki also finished second to Conners in the shot put with a toss of 42 feet 3 1/2 inches.
Westhill finished second in all three relays — the 4×800 (9:02.31), 4×400 (3:41.85) and 4×200 (1:41.90) – as Files, Legnetto, Corcoran, Moore, Joe Altman, Ryan Brennen and Pete Clark all took part.
The state qualifier takes place next Wednesday night at Manley, with the state championships set for March 8 at Cornell University in Ithaca.
