Most of the area’s cross country teams situated in the Onondaga High School League Liberty division would not open their league schedules until this week, but Marcellus got a jump on all of them.
The Mustangs swept last Wednesday’s league opener against Phoenix, prevailing 17-43 on the boys side with a sweep of the top three individual spots. Joe Riccardi claimed the race in 17 minutes, 38 seconds, while Matt Strempil (17:43) beat out Ethan Mosure (17:44) for second place.
Bryce Byrnes finished fourth for the Firebirds in 17:56, but Marcellus runners swept the rest of the top 10. Michael Welch beat out Sean Raymond for fifth place, each finishing in 18:16, while Andrew Marsh was seventh in 18:17. Grayson Hoag and Mike Brown each finished in 18:25 and Riley Burns posted 18:35.
In the girls 19-40 victory, Liliana Cushman won the individual race in a time of 21 minutes, 15 seconds, just ahead of Morgan Gould, who was second in 21:27.
After Phoenix’s Julianna Lewis finished third (21:44), the Mustangs earned four of the next five spots to clinch the win. Crystal Silliman was fourth, in 22:55, with Carolyn Carlic fifth in 23:02. Maggie Stempel got seventh place in 24:44 as Emma Stewart made it to eighth place in 26:02.
Jordan-Elbridge would play host to Saturday’s Kamikaze Invitational, an event that combined 2.6 miles of distance running with jumps over 16 hay bales, adding to the challenge, but also the fun.
Here, Marcellus would finish second in the boys division with 70 points, trailing only Baldwinsville, who prevailed with 30 points. Individually, Riccardi finished sixth in 13:54, five seconds ahead of Stempell (13:59) in seventh place as Homer’s Grant Stokoe won in 13:38.
Of the top 25 finishers, six of them were Mustangs as Mosure got 15th place in 14:16, with Raymond 19th (14:25) and Hoag 23rd in 14;29, two spots ahead of Marsh (14:40). Welch finished 35th in 14:55.
J-E, as the host team, finished ninth on the boys side, led by Ethan Kinney, who finished 29th in 14:48. Evan Brunelle (15:13) edged out Sean Dristle (15:14) for 46th place, while Hugh Schader (15:17) and Jared Alpha (15:26) were 50th and 52nd, respectively. Logan Kinney (15:32) and Matt Sheldon (15:39) were close behind.
Solvay finished 19th, with Jonah Wheeler leading the Bearcats as he took 74th place in 16 minutes flat, with John Brusa posting 16:47 ahead of Max Melnyx (17:18), Tim Brusa (18:29), Adam Delucia (19:01) and Arthur Germakovski (21:21).
Moving to the girls side at the J-E meet, Marcellus finished fourth with 155 points, with Cushman getting sixth place in 17:09 as, again, B’ville claimed the team title and, in this instance, had the individual champion with Justus Holden-Betts, who prevailed in 15:40.
Helping out Cushman, Silliman got 23rd place in 18:33, with Carlic 30th (18:57) and Stempel 36th in 19:18. Stewart (20:49) and Amy Francesconi (21:57) were further back.
On its way to a seventh-place team finish, host J-E had Mary Elizabeth Dristle get a ninth-place time of 17:21, more than two minutes ahead of Eagles teammate Maggie DeJohn, who was 37th in 19:23. Madi Daly was 45th in 19:54, beating out Olivia Minikhiem (20:10), Delaney Dunham (20:37), Lindsay Jackson (22:10) and Meghan Jackson (23:12).
West Genesee would split its CNY Counties League clash with Cicero-North Syracuse, with the girls Wildcats prevailing by a 21-36 margin.
Emily Young, in a time of 19:29.2, got away from C-NS’s Annina Marullo, who finished in 19:39 flat, for the individual race win, while Carly Benson was third in 19:50.1 and Mia Mitchell (20:02.4) took fourth place. Hannah Craybas (20:48.8) and Kendall Dombroske (21:07.2) were sixth and seventh, respectively, as Liz Morey took 10th place in 21:42.2.
A close boys meet saw WG take a 27-30 defeat to C-NS, even as David Leff dominated the individual race, his time of 16:39.8 more than half a minute ahead of the field that included the Northstars’ Brandon Martin, who in 17:11 flat edged teammate Nathan Poirier (17:11.3) for second place.
WG saw Sean Byrnes get third place in 17:21.2 and Ryan Dunning gain fourth place in 17:28.2, only to have C-NS counter by getting four of the next five spots, with only Paul Stannard able to break that spell for the Wildcats as he took eighth place in 17:58.4.
