In the course of a month, the Marcellus boys cross country team squared off against each of the other seven OHSL Liberty division squads – and beat them all.
The Mustangs, no. 2 in the latest state Class B rankings, completed this season-long sweep Wednesday against Jordan-Elbridge, holding off the Eagles 24-33 in a first-place showdown.
Marcellus also topped Christian Brothers Academy 22-39 in the three-way meet, while J-E beat the Brothers by that same 22-39 margin to secure second place in the league standings.
The presence of CBA star Brendan Smith forced the Mustangs’ Jesse Garn to increase his tempo. Garn obliged, and his time of 17 minutes, six seconds was enough to beat Smith (17:19) by 13 seconds.
Just as important, Garn’s teammate, Ryan Manahan, rolled to third place in 17:30, nearly half a minute better than J-E’s best runner, Jack Gugel, who was fourth in 17:54. Two more Eagle runners followed as Steve Slonosky finished fifth (17:56) and Greg Bader took sixth place in 18:02.
To clinch matters, the Mustangs had four more runners finish ahead of the rest of the J-E pack. Justin Garn was seventh in 18:41, just ahead of Joe Fallon (18:42) in eighth, while John Bell (18:49) edged out Mike Epp (18:50) for ninth place.
The girls meet proved more lopsided in favor of Marcellus as it rolled past J-E 17-44 and CBA 21-38, with the Eagles squeaking past the Brothers by a one-point margin, 28-29.
Rachel Garn led a 1-2-3 sweep at the top for the hosts, as Garn prevailed in 21 minutes, 50 seconds. Maggie Dunn took second in 22 minutes flat and Molly McGuane was third in 22:36.
The Eagles’ Phebe Alley fit her way into fifth place in 23:37 amid a pack of CBA runners, but the Mustangs would take over again. Jennifer Linn was eighth in 23:59, part of a pack where Eliza Bell (24:00) and Nadia Bennacer (24:01) also ran well.
Westhill’s girls cross country team nearly denied Cazenovia a league title on Thursday, but lost a narrow 28-31 decision and also fell to Skaneateles by that same margin. Despite this, Betsy Black and Jessica Curry still went 1-2 among individuals, both finishing in a time of 19:46 as Lissa DiPaola finished seventh in 20:30.
The Warriors did sweep Skaneateles (18-37) and Cazenovia (21-38) in the boys race, where Will Downs finished second in 17:47. Jon Moore (17:57) and Casey Bunce (18:01) were third and fourth, respectively, with Peter Lynch sixth in 18:26 and Mitchell Lamb (18:45) in ninth place.
Back on Wednesday, Solvay split a head-to-head meet with Hannibal, winning 19-40 on the girls side, but losing to the Warriors by that exact same margin in the boys race.
Ashlee Riggins won an exciting girls race for the Bearcats, beating Hannibal’s Michaela Sheldon to the line by one second with her time of 21:12.
Kara Roskoff, with a third-place clocking of 22:03, led the next pack as Christina Clemente finished fourth (23:18), Michelle Slowik was fifth (23:39), Katie Roskoff got sixth (24:21) and Rachel Campbell took seventh in 25:53.
In an eerily similar boys race, Solvay’s Cody McCarthy almost won, his time of 16:14 just one second behind Hannibal’s Sherzod Shamiev. But the Warriors took the next four spots before Nate Carr (17:05) fit into seventh place for the Bearcats. Matt Battaglia was eighth in 17:25.
J-E would win both of the small-school divisions at Saturday’s Weedsport invitational. On the boys side, Bader, in a time of 16:45.1, led a 1-2-3 sweep at the top as Gugel finished second (16:53.6) and Slonosky (16:53.9) got third place. Tom Poppe was 10th in 17:56.7 as Scott Sullivan took 13th, Alex Sulsik 14th and Carlin Coomey got 21st place.
In the girls race, where J-E won with 40 points to Weedsport’s total of 47 points, Brianna Byrnes was ninth in 22:35.4, with Courtney Hourigan 10th in 22:42.1. Jessica Salisbury was 12th, in 22:45 flat, while Kerry Mack was 15th (23:21.6), Emma Cooney 16th (23:26.8) and Natalie Emerick took 18th place in 23:39.9. Westhill finished in the back of the large-school pack on both sides, with Amanda Kaley 23rd among the girls and Kyle Fitch 32nd among the boys.
