The quartet of area high school indoor track and field teams will all have representation when the top athletes gather at Cornell University on March 7 for the New York State Public High School Athletic Association championship meet.
Fayetteville-Manlius, Jamesville-DeWitt, East Syracuse Minoa and Christian Brothers Academy all got first-place finishes during the course of Wednesday night’s Section III state qualifier at Onondaga Community College’s SRC Arena.
Limiting himself to one individual event, F-M’s Bryce Millar held off Liverpool’s Ben Petrella, 9:15.66 to 9:16.22, in the 3,200-meter run, with Adam Hunt (9:36.07) beating out J-D’s Patrick Dye (9:38.16) for fifth place, and Patrick Perry and Riley Hughes in the next two spots. Dye also finished sixth in the mile in 4:46.97.
Kyle Barber pulled away and took the 1,000-meter run in 2:30.62, nearly seven seconds ahead of Liverpool’s Nick LeClair (2:37.29), also helping Millar, Jon Abbott and Hamza El Habbal to a top time of 8:12.58 in the 4×800 relay.
F- M’s Christabel Ezidegwu won the girls triple jump, her top leap of 36 feet 8 ½ inches four inches better than Cicero-North Syracuse’s Javielle Fanizzi (36’4 ½”), while ESM’s Mia Montgomery (34’ 8 ¼”) took third place. In the long jump, Ezidegwu finished third, going 17’4 ½”.
Also for the Hornets, Sophia Ryan pulled away to win the 3,000-meter run in 10:28.89, with Samantha Levy (10:31.42) and Mackenzie Pierie (10:59.48) completing a 1-2-3 Hornets sweep.
Then Sophia Ryan joined Olivia Ryan, Annika Avery and Jenna Farrell to win the 4×800 relay in 9:42.93, just holding off West Genesee (9:44.87) at the wire. Olivia Ryan was second (2:57.99) to WG’s Carly Benson (2:55.09) in the 1,000-meter run, with J-D’s Elena Haarer fourth in 3:06.04.
In the 1,500-meter run, it was ESM’s Natalie Marra earning the victory. With Avery close behind her, Marra, in 4:49.15, crossed the line 1.19 seconds ahead of Avery (4:50.34) as J-D’s Hannah Butler was fourth in 4:57.03.
Marra was joined in the winner’s column by ESM teammate Jeremy McGrath, who qualified second for the finals in the boys 55-meter hurdles behind Baldwinsville’s Evan Donhauser, but then beat Donhauser, 7.97 seconds to 8.02, for the victory in the finals.
CBA’s Anna Schug atoned for a false start in the 55-meter dash final after she qualified first in 7.39 seconds by winning the 300-meter dash. Once starting properly, Schug, in 40.94 seconds, pulled away from Altmar-Parish-Williamstown’s Skylar Pastor (41.72 seconds) for the top spot as Kiana Ferguson was ninth (44.07 seconds) and F-M’s Shauna Cheatham 11th.
J-D’s lone victory came in the girls 55 hurdles, where freshman Alexandria Payne, in a time of 9.14 seconds, edged out Hannibal’s Taylor Dence (9.15 seconds) by one-hundredth of a second. Payne also tied for 10th in the high jump, clearing 4’8”, and helped Haarer, Casey Keane and Rachel Fairbanks J-D take fourth in the 4×400 relay in 4:15.47.
Will Cote, in the boys long jump, earned a berth in the state meet by finishing second with a leap of 20’8 ¼” behind Rome Free Academy’s Brian Slaughter (21’1 ¼”), while Patrece Martin went 15’ 5 ¼” to get ninth place in the long jump.
Fairbanks was seventh in the 600-meter run in 1:45.32, just ahead of ESM’s Juliette Miller (1:45.90) in eighth place. Sara Signorelli tied for sixth (8’6”) in the pole vault. F-M also saw Ed Cheatham get fifth place in the 300-meter dash in 37.81 seconds, while Gwenn Shepardson took fifth (9.41 seconds) in the 55 hurdles behind Payne.
