Though they won’t meet in the regular season until Oct. 8, the Cazenovia girls cross country team first raced against main OHSL Liberty division rival Skaneateles on Saturday as part of the Chittenango Invitational at Jamesville Beach Park.
This first showdown, on the same course where they’ll run the Section III championship races on Nov. 2, went to the other Lakers as Skaneateles, with 56 points, edged Cicero-North Syracuse (60 points) to win the team portion of Race 1, with Cazenovia gaining 86 points for third place.
Jeanette Cudney led Cazenovia’s efforts, getting seventh place in a time of 20 minutes, 39.9 seconds, though she and everyone else was chasing Skaneateles sophomore Kaitlyn Neal, who won in 19:06.4, the best individual time of the entire meet (three races were run).
Megan Stanford, in 21:07.5, found her way to 10th place, but three Skaneateles runners – Julia Willcox, Madeline Adams and Liz Dwyer – hit the line in the 12th through 14th spots just before Mya Walters earned 15th place in 21:22.4.
Hayley Frost had a strong race, taking 17th place in 21:28.9, while Mimi Gabor finished 39th (22:41.6). Kaitlin Rossiter (22:50.6) and Adrien Owens (23:05.9) also had top-50 finishes.
As for host Chittenango, who finished seventh in the 16-team Race 1 field with 208 points, Anna Galbraith beat all of the Cazenovia runners, the junior finishing fourth in a clocking of 20:03.5.
But the Bears did not have any other top-50 finishers, as Hayley Foran (23:11.7) and Brooke Busa (23:17.9) fell just outside that group, with Kailey Cavarese (24:12.9) and Kaitlyn Swain (24:26.6) also finished well.
Moving to the boys Race 1 at the Chittenango meet, the Bears did quite well, picking up 134 points to win a close battle for third place in a field of 14, with West Genesee (23 points) and C-NS (41 points) far ahead in the top two. Cazenovia was 11th with 292 points.
Mike Capeling, whose time of 18:26.8 put him in 23rd place, led the way for Chittenango. Isaac Czarnecki, in 25th (18:32.4), and Jon Roberts, in 26th (18:33.3), both were close behind Capeling, as was Robbie Howard in 30th place (18:45.5). Kenny Galbraith was 39th in 19:02.8.
Cazenovia’s Kevin Ridings led his side, getting to 32nd place in a time of 18:48.6, but the rest of the Lakers were further back. Drew Devendorf (20:11.0) led that group, with Cody Dennis (20:34.3) and Matt Mistur (20:37.3) also in the top half of a 222-runner field.
