Verona — Throughout the autumn, East Syracuse Minoa girls cross country senior Natalie Marra found herself at the front of the field, reaching the finish line before her competitors did.
And Marra did so one more time last Saturday at Vernon-Verona-Sherrill High School, earning herself the individual Section III Class B championship and a trip to Monroe-Woodbury for this weekend’s New York State Public High School Athletic Association championship meet.
The indivual race saw Marra steadily pull away from Jamesville-DeWitt junior Hannah Butler. In exactly 19 minutes, 10 seconds, Marra prevailed, with Butler settling for second place in 19:18.8, but also advancing to the state meet with Whitesboro’s Justyna Wilkinson, Homer’s McKayla Crawford and Camden’s Morgan Lucason.
J-D, as a team, wanted to get to Monroe-Woodbury, too, engaging in a spirited clash with Westhill-Bishop Ludden for the Class B team title, but when it was done, the Red Rams had 61 points, six behind the Warriors’ 55 points, as ESM claimed fifth place with 148 points.
To lead Westhill-Ludden, Alaina Kenny finished fourth, in a time of 19:59.2, with Genny Corcoran getting to fifth place in 20:05.7 sandwiched in between Butler and Sophia Vinciguerra, who finished eighth in 20:17.8, just 3.1 seconds behind Lucason for that final place on the sectional All-Star team for the state meet.
Though the Rams were tied for the team lead at that point, Westhill-Ludden got in front when Haylei Coolican got 10th place in 20:42.7, four spots ahead of J-D’s Amelia Gilbert (21:40.4) in 14th place.
Then tThe Warriors’ Maura McAnaney (21:47.0) beat out the Rams’ Emily Shapiro (21:49.4) for 16th place and Annibel Coolican clinched it for Westhill-Ludden by finishing 25th in 22:19.7, one ahead of Abby Palin, who was 26th in 22:20 flat, followed by Alexandra Street (32nd, 22:43.1), Ayla Erwin (38th, 22:53.7) and Abbie Leavitt (42nd, 23:06.6).
continued — On ESM’s side, Marina Lopez was the top performer outside of Marra, running to 22nd place in 22:13.8. Megan Vanderwarker finished 37th in 22:50.8, while Sarah Tingley finished 45th in 23:15.7 and Yamila Wunsch (23:59.0) beat out Olivia Ravera (24:04.3) for 61st place.
Marra isn’t the only ESM runner headed for Monroe-Woodbury. So is Matt Young, who led the Spartans to a fourth-place in the boys sectional Class B race at VVS with 155 points as New Hartford (93 points) edged Carthage (104 points) for its first-ever team sectional title.
Young wasn’t going to catch Carthage’s vaunted brother tandem of Noah Affolder (16:13.5) and Sam Affolder (16:31.9), but he beat the rest of the field, finishing in16 minutes, 47.7 seconds.
By getting third place, Young will join the Affolder brothers, along with Chittenango’s Mike Capeling and Cortland’s Andrew Boyce, at the state meet, but the Spartans nearly got another entry thanks to Jared Henry, who stormed to sixth place in 17:07 flat, less than three second behind Boyce’s 17:04.1.
Elsewhere for ESM, Nick Berg claimed 15th place in 17:52.9, while David Rivers was 38th in 18:46.8 and Jacob Perrotta (20:16.1) was further Back.
J-D, meanwhile, was ninth in the 18-team Class B field, led by Andrew Comanici, who grabbed 25th place in 18:18.3. James Pieri finished 42nd in 18:57.4, with Matt Salbert 46th in exactly 19 minutes and Nick Mannion (19:13.1), Sam Glisson (19;17.4) and Adam Hyatt ( 19:21.5) close behind.
It also proved a stellar meet for Christian Brothers Academy junior Dominic Morganti, who advanced to Monroe-Woodbury by finishing second in the sectional Class C race in 16 minutes, 40.3 seconds, trailing only Hannibal’s Jason McFarland, who won in 16:21.3. Morganti, McFarland, Ryan O’Rourke (Adirondack), Adam VanValkenburgh (Canastota) and Chris Celecki (Holland Patent) will run at the state meet.
Morganti helped CBA get seventh place (196 points) in a 17-team field headed by Marcellus, who prevailed with 67 points to Adirondack’s 82. Brendan Keeney gave the Brothers a 25th-place time of 18:24.5, while Duncan Brickner was 40th in 18:54.2.
Tom Culeton was 69th, in 19:38.9, four spots ahead of Riley Nash (19:42.7) in 73rd place. Also for CBA, Lucy Person finished 10th in the girls sectional Class C race in 21:39 flat, three spots away from moving on to the state meet.
