For much of the 2008 season, the Westhill boys track and field team lingered in the considerable shadow of Solvay — but in a short period of time, all that has changed.
First, the Warriors edged past the Bearcats in the OHSL Liberty division meet on May 21 in Marcellus. Then, nine days later on that same Marcellus track, the Warriors lay claim to the Section III Class B-1 championship in impressive style.
Overall, the Warriors with 130 points, comfortably ahead of Holland Patent (93 points), who took second place. Solvay had to settle for fourth place, with 63 points, as Clinton (81 points) slid into third.
Westhill piled up points in distance races, especially the mile, where a 1-2-3 finish yielded 24 points. Andrew Corcoran won, in a time of 4:22.74, while Eric Moore took second place (4:31.10) and Chris Moore finished third, in 4:39.04.
Over in the 3,000-meter steeplechase, Vinny Savastano and Kevin Zych provided a 1-2 finish as Savastano claimed victory in 10:20.73, just ahead of Zych (10:22.43) at the wire. Corcoran added a second in the 3,200-meter run (10:02.83) as Zych finished fifth, while Eric Moore landed in second place in the 800-meter run in 2:01.49.
Moving to the sprints, Pavle Bujanovic delivered a victory in the 400-meter dash, earning a time of 51.18 seconds to hold off South Jefferson’s Curtis Wilson (51.64 seconds), as Anthony Legnetto (52.88 seconds) took fourth place. Jesse Krell contributed a fourth-place time of 24.09 seconds in the 200-meter dash and Dymytry Mazuryk was fourth (1:00.49) in the 400 hurdles.
To cap this off, Corcoran, Bujanovic, Eric Moore and Chris Moore got together and, in the 4×800 relay, won in a clocking of 8:18.48, nearly nine seconds ahead of Marcellus at the wire. Westhill was also second in both the 4×100 (45.89 seconds) and 4×400 (3:26.41) relays as Krell, Bujanovic, Mazuryk, Legnetto, Ryan Files, Matt Trendowski and Tom Trendowski got involved.
In field events, Westhill teammates Tom Fisher (44 feet 9 1/4 inches) and Tom Trendowski (44 feet 5 inches) were third and fourth, respectively, in the shot put, with Fisher also getting fourth in the shot put with a toss of 129 feet. Eric Garofano earned second place in the five-event pentathlon, earning 2,457 points.
Even with Solvay’s struggles, some magic could be found — including the 4×400 relay, where Greg Manning, Mike Acchione, Paul Delprato and Jeremy Parker won in a time of 3:24.46, beating Westhill by nearly two full seconds.
Acchione raced to a winning time of 57.98 seconds in the 400-meter hurdles, as teammate Will Hnatko finished second in 59.43 seconds. In the triple jump, Acchione was fifth, going 38 feet 5 1/2 inches, while Parker ran to third in the 400 in 51.68 seconds.
Jason Conners continued his win streak in the shot put, tossing it 54 feet 8 1/4 inches to go with his fifth (125 feet 1 inch) in the discus.
Manning, disqualified in the 800, teamed with Hnatko, Delprato and Matt Fedrizzi for third place in the 4×800 relay (8:27.56), while Tyler Grim, Casey Pucello, Chris Hoffman and Brian Wright combined to finish fourth in the 4×100 in 46.58 seconds.
