Oneida and Vernon-Verona-Sherrill, like all the other cross country teams gathered for last Tuesday’s Tri-Valley League championships, would end up chasing the hosts from Holland Patent, and find them unable to catch. In the boys edition, the Indians finished fourth in the eight-team field, with 108 points, while the Red Devils settled for fifth place with 126 points as HP, with 26 points, easily prevailed. Among individuals, Conor McCarthy (who finished 11th in the Liverpool Invitational on Oct. 15) gave Oneida a fourth-place finish in 17 minutes, 34.5 seconds, while VVS’s Seth MacDonald finished in 18:00.1 and took seventh place. Behind McCarthy, teammate Will Coulter finished 12th, in 18:32.3, while Joe Casella got 14th place in 18:42.6. Paul Greene was 48th in 20:36 flat and Sevack Danadian, in 67th (21:25.8), rounded out the scoring. VVS saw Erick Faherty take 29th place in 19:55.0, while Adam Litterio was 37th (20:07.7) and Zane Hasty was 40th in 20:19.0. Kyle Tarry (20:39.1) beat out Kyle Ossant (20:46.8) for the last scoring spot. The girls edition of the Tri-Valley championships also saw Holland Patent win with 26 points, well clear of the field. Oneida again settled into fourth place, with 100 points, as VVS took seventh place with 174 points. Sara Rifendifer ran strong for the Indians, finishing sixth in a clocking of 21:32.1, with Kim DeCarr gaining 13th place in 22:42.2. Oneida’s Erin Durdan earned 19th place in 23:18.1 as Lena Reginelli was 26th (23:52.7) and Jennifer Scholl ran to 47th place in 25:07.7. As for the Red Devils, Kerry Miley needed 22:55 to run to 16th place and lead her side. Emily Hudson was 36th, in 24:37.8, with Kayla Prentice 49th (25:12.5) and McKenna Novak 52nd (25:23.6) as Kayla Fazekas (26:41.4) finished 61st. On a much smaller scale, Cazenovia’s girls cross country team hosted the Madison County Invitational and got an up-close look at Hamilton’s seventh-grade sensation, Sage Hurta. Again proving her talent, Hurta won the race with a time of 19:48, nearly a minute ahead of the Lakers’ Hollie Marcelle (20:44). Rae Tobey was third in 20:47. Malone Gabor (21:05) and Michelle Karker (21:08) rounded out the top five as more Lakers, including Janet Cudney (21:13), Emma Wolsey (22:06), Alex Dolbear (22:08), Margaret Wolsey (22:13) and Rachel Grimm (22:26) followed. Meanwhile, in the boys race Cazenovia’s Pat Dermody won in a time of 17:26, 12 seconds ahead of Hamilton’s Austin Hirsch, who was second in 17:38. Emerald Knights teammates Danny Jacobs (18:46) and Tommy Bodney (19:13) were third and fifth, respectively, with the Lakers’ Ben Langey fourth in 18:55. Also for Cazenovia, Darian Smith (20:02), Jack Woltman (20:19) and Leland Cudney (20:26) reached the top 10 in between Hamilton’s Ben Parfitt (20:25) in ninth. Canastota’s Andrew Rapasadi was 11th in 20:30, the best finish for either of the Raiders’ squads, as Steve Maio was 13th in 21:05. Laker runners Brian Johnson (20:53) and Brendan Hartnett (21:24) also had solid showings.