On the same Wednesday night, the Cicero-North Syracuse and Liverpool girls swim teams both met unbeaten opponents – and met the same fate, too.
In the Northstars’ case, it hosted Baldwinsville at the LeMoyne College pool and, despite some fine individual work from Breanna Ruffrage and Emily Altier, lost to the Bees 100-81.
Ruffrage got involved in an exciting 50 freestyle duel with B’ville’s Kaitlyn Martin, and they would finish in a dead heat, each touching the wall in 26.84 seconds. Later, Ruffrage would win by herself in the 100 freestyle in 58.88 seconds.
As for Altier, she worked her way to the top in the 500 freestyle, prevailing in 5:49.28, while later in the meet she, along with Ruffrage, Nicole Blidy and Kim Morris, claimed first in the 400 freestyle relay in 4:05.05. Charis Parker led B’ville with wins in the 200 individual medley (2:25.43) and 100 breaststroke (1:12.23).
While this was going on, Liverpool visited the other CNYCL team with a perfect mark, West Genesee, and claimed two relays, but still took a 97-83 defeat to the Wildcats.
Madeline Murphy did give the Warriors a title in the 50 freestyle, blazing to a time of 25.65 seconds. She also teamed with Renee Stromski, Madison Hall and Madison Sestak to get first place in the 400 freestyle relay in 4:01.61.
Earlier, in the 200 freestyle relay, Hall, Stromski, Mikayla VanSlyke and Ashley Zemotel claimed a victory in 1:53.77. WG dominated the individual events as Olivia Castro, with wins in the 200 freestyle (2:00.63) and 100 freestyle (54.86 seconds), prevailed twice.
On Friday, Liverpool would win a non-league meet against Manlius-Pebble Hill by a score of 97-83, with Sestak at the forefront. She won the 50 freestyle in 27.43 seconds, added a victory in the 100 freestyle (59.81 seconds) and helped Zemotel, Stromski and Murphy tear through the 200 freestyle relay in 1:49.31.
Murphy earned first place in the 200 freestyle in 2:07.05, with Stromski needing 2:36.08 to earn the top spot in the 200 IM. Zemotel beat the field in the 100 breaststroke in 1:19.31.
Liverpool closes its regular season next Wednesday, hosting Oswego, just as the CNS side takes on the combined Syracuse city squad at Nottingham, where the Section III meet takes place Nov. 2-5.
