One more time, the winter weather affected plans for the Skaneateles indoor track and field teams, as its appearance in the Section III Class B championships at SRC Arena got pushed back 24 hours by the largest snowstorm of the season.
They would get started, though, Thursday night, and the girls and boys Lakers both would post strong showings and earn plenty of victories by the time the sectional meet was done.
With 91 points, the Skaneateles girls beat everyone in the 10-team field except those other Lakers from Cazenovia, who did not win a single individual event, but parlayed two relay titles and high finishes everywhere else to a first-place total of 128.5 points.
Skaneateles started fast with a 1-2 effort from Kaitlyn Neal and Madeline Adams in the 3,000-meter run. The pair ran together and almost crossed the finish line at the same time, but Neal, in 10 minutes, 59.89 seconds, edged Adams (10:59.94) by five-hundredths of a second.
Later, in a 1,500-meter classic, Neal went after her rival, Marcellus’ Rachel Garn, who had already won the 1,000-meter run. Here, Neal finished in 4:52.04, but was 0.53 seconds behind Garn, who prevailed in 4:51.51.
In the 4×800 relay, Skaneateles would get the best of Cazenovia as Neal and Adams, joined by Julia Willcox and Liz Dwyer, finished in 10:21.21, with Cazenovia (10:31.41) more than 10 seconds behind.
Each of the three relays turned into Laker duels. In the 4×400, Olivia Gage, Alana Navaroli, Katelyn Ellison and Aubreah Lynn finished in 4:28.37, with Cazenovia (4:22.17) out in front, and the same was true in a tight 4×200 where Ellison, Gage, Taylor Woodruff and Amanda Wetmore got a time of 1:52.79, but Cazenovia (1:52.57) won by a scant 0.27 seconds.
Navaroli did win, though, in the shot put, as her throw of 31 feet 9 ½ inches beat out Marcellus’ Suzanna Sylcox (31’6”) and the field. Wetmore, in 7.68 seconds, finished second to CBA’s Anna Schug (7.54 seconds) in the 55-meter dash, while Woodruff (7.73 seconds) took fourth place.
Willcox finished fourth in the 1,000-meter run in 3:26.30 and was sixth in the 600-meter run, where Adams (1:48.85) was fifth.
Keely Gregg cleared 7’6” in the pole vault and took fourth place, while Lynn got to fourth place in the high jump with a top leap of 4’8”. Ellison also had a fifth-place finish, in the 300-meter dash, where she finished in 45.74 seconds.
Moving to the boys sectional Class B meet, Connor Hill led a strong effort for Skaneateles, who finished fifth in a 10-team field with 41 points as Solvay, with 118 points, pulled away for the title.
In the first race of the day, Hill, paired with Patrick Biver, Cooper Watt and Griffin Lawson, helped the Lakers pull away in the 4×400 relay as their time of three minutes, 35.60 seconds beat runner-up CBA (3:42.87) by more than seven seconds.
Later on, in the 300-meter dash, Hill pulled away and, in 37.34 seconds, beat Solvay’s Eric Goodrich (38.35 seconds) by a full second as Biver, in 39.93 seconds, took fifth place.
As if that wasn’t enough, Hill pushed the Lakers to an impressive victory in the 4×200, too, as he joined Biver, Lawson and Nick Smolenski for a top time of 1:37.47, with Solvay (1:39.39) nearly two seconds back in second place.
Eight more points for the Lakers came from the shot put, where Sepp Martin threw its 41’5 ¾”, putting him in third place as teammate Zach Schneider (40’7”) got fifth place. Lawson had a sixth-place long jump of 17’10 ¾”.
