Though it wanted a sweep, the Cicero-North Syracuse cross country team could not quite reach that mark during Wednesday’s CNY Counties League National division championship meet at Baldwinsville.
The Northstars did prevail in the girls meet, getting 30 points to hold off Liverpool (39 points) and Baldwinsville (53 points) in a spirited three-way competition.
By far, the key to CNS’s win was a 1-2-3 sweep at the top. Jackie Halstead won in 18 minutes, 42.99 seconds, edging out teammate Nicole Watterud (18:43.52) by less than a second as Taylor Parry slid into third place in 19:04.34.
This inoculated the Northstars from the fact that five Liverpool runners would beat Marissa Colburn, in 11th place (20:08.78), to the line. Kaitlyn McNamara led the Warriors, as she got fifth place in a clocking of 19:15.68.
Abby McNamara, who finished seventh in 19:24.90, led rest of the Liverpool pack. Caroline Dieffenderfer claimed eighth place in 19:27.87, while Jessica Turner was ninth in 19:50.81 and Morgan Mahoney was 10th in 19:53.96.
In the following pack for CNS, Katie Laris (20:26.14) and Madison Kolakowski (20:27.34) were 13th and 14th, respectively, while Emily Dolan was 19th in 20:51.21.
Moving to the boys CNYCL National race, CNS watched as B’ville got payback for losing to the Northstars at Oneida Shores on Oct. 12. With 43 points, CNS finished behind the Bees (35 points), but just ahead of Liverpool, who slid into third place with 49 points.
Anthony Lupia, with a time of 16:06.4, was second to B’ville’s Alec Peinkofer (15:34.46), while Neil Gill was third in 16:07.99. Liverpool’s Anthony Ostuni led his side with a fourth-place finish in 16:19.08, just ahead of teammate Drew Henry, who was fifth in 16:25.93.
For the rest of the Northstars, Bryan Junod was ninth, in 16:40.05, while Colin Greenseich got 12th place in 16:48.93. Paul DeGennaro (16:55.02) gained 17th place as Ken Ryan was 19th in 16:58.68.
Liverpool’s Travis Chewning-Kulick had a 10th-place clocking of 16:45.30, with Kevin Abel getting 14th place in 16:50.65. Adam Zinger was 16th (16:54.3) and Alex Christensen was 18th in 16:57.93.
