With one chance to earn a championship together, the Cazenovia girls indoor track and field team was in no mood to stop its winning ways.
So the Lakers went back to Onondaga Community College’s SRC Arena Thursday night and, with 153.5 points, roared to the Division 2 championship of the Onondaga High School League, nearly double what runner-up Skaneateles (83.5 points) could manage. Hannibal, with 44 points, was far back in third place.
Already with the Section III Class B title in hand, Cazenovia won in every possible discipline, but especially dominated in field events, taking three of five titles.
Liz Pittman cleared 8 feet to win the pole vault over Skaneateles’ Keely Gregg (7’6″), and then turned her attention to the triple jump, where her top attempt of 32’5 3/4″ was second to Ashley Kent, who gave the Lakers another title by going 33’6″ in her final attempt.
Then Jessica Macheda joined in by winning the long jump, going 15’1 1/4″ to beat out Hannibal’s Kristen D’Angelo (14’6″) as Pittman (14’2 1/2″) got fourth place. Sarah Haley (26’2 1/2″) and Hannah Dain (25’10”) were third and fourth, respectively, in the shot put, while Tori Fischer cleared 4’6″ in the high jump to take third place, with Macheda sixth.
On the track, Cazenovia pulled away in the 4×800 relay, seeing Jeanette Cudney, Megan Henderson, Colleen Stalder and Grace Milmoe finish in 10 minutes, 26.55 seconds, with Hannibal (11:31.85) more than a minute behind them.
Individually, Samantha Gates broke through with her victory in the 600-meter run. Going 1:47.35, Gates pulled away from Skaneateles’ Julia Willcox (1:49.51) and prevailed.
In the other two relays, the Lakers had runner-up finishes. Henderson joined Gates, Sarah Willard and Olivia McEntee in a thrilling 4×400 where, in 4:20.92, Cazenovia was just behind Skaneateles (4:20.79) at the wire. Willard, Julia Raleigh, Clare Costello and Jessie Matt were second (1:54.27), again to Skaneateles (1:52.20), in a 4×200 relay that didn’t have a photo finish.
Cudney worked her way to second place in the 3,000-meter run in 11:16.68 behind Skaneateles’ Kaitlyn Neal (10:29.70), with Mya Walters (12:43.52) settling into fifth place. Milmoe grabbed second place in the 1,000-meter run in 3:24.88 to Hannibal’s Reilly Harris (3:16.55), with Stalder (3:29.97) taking third to give the Lakers 14 points in that event.
Henderson had her own runner-up effort, as she was second (5:18.25) to another Skaneateles runner, Madeline Adams (5:01.79), in the 1,500-meter run, with Meredith Shephard sixth.
Molly Carges, in 9.71 seconds, gained second place behind Pulaski star Breann Burns (8.45 seconds) in the 55-meter hurdles, where Kent was fourth in 9.89 seconds. Costello was fourth in the 55-meter dash in 7.76 seconds and matched that finish in the 300-meter dash with a time of 43.85 seconds as Willard got sixth place.
A night earlier, the Cazenovia boys indoor track team made deep inroads during its OHSL Division 2 meet at SRC Arena, picking up 53 points to finish fourth out of 11 teams as Jordan-Elbridge, with 104 points, went to the top.
Sean Satchwell delivered a victory for the Lakers in the mile. In four minutes, 53.24 seconds, Satchwell held off Onondaga’s Connor Oakman (4:55.87) by more than two seconds to prevail.
Casey Fenton earned Cazenovia’s other title, in the triple jump. With a top leap of 37 feet 6 ¼ inches, Fenton easily beat Tully’s Steven Hust (35’8 ½”) and the rest of the field.
Alex Devine and Ryan O’Herien both vied for top honors in the 55-meter dash. Devine finished second, in 7.11 seconds, with O’Herien (7.25 seconds) in third, each of them trailing J-E’s Dylan Whittico, who won in 6.97 seconds.
In the 4×200, Devine and O’Herien, joining Will Fellows and Casey Fenton, posted a time of 1:40.76, which edged out Tully (1:41.11) for second place as Skaneateles took the title in 1:36.86.
Satchwell, joined by Sawyer Hunt, Brendon Coffey and Sean McPherson, made it to third place in the 4×800 relay in 9:52.48.
Reed Lucas was fifth in the shot put, tossing it 37’11 ¾”, with Devine getting fifth place (16’3 ½”) in the long jump. Fellows made his way to sixth place in the 600 in 1:35.69, while Brendan Coffey was seventh in the 1,000 in 3:07.77, while Derek White took eighth place in the 300 sprint.
Chittenango picked up 16 points in the OHSL Division 1 meet. John Dullen, Joe Fanto, Joe Carter and Nick Stanton were fourth in the 4×200 in 1:45.22 as Mike Capeling, Isaac Czarnecki, Kenny Galbreath and Ben Seale were fifth (9:17.60) in the 4×800.
Czarnecki earned the Bears’ best individual finish as he got fourth place in the 3,200 in 10:36.70. Capeling was fifth in the mile in 4:55.92 and eighth in the 1,000, with Fanto fifth in the 55 sprint in 7.06 seconds and sixth in the 300. Dullen also got sixth place in the triple jump (36’3”). Martin Boyd was seventh in the high jump as Seale was ninth in the 600.
Many of these Cazenovia stars will return to SRC Arena next Wednesday night for the Section III state qualifier, vying for berths in the March 1 state championship meet at Cornell University’s Barton Hall.
