For this year’s edition of the CNY Counties League championship meet, Baldwinsville’s cross country team had the advantage of knowing the terrain since the race would take place at the course around Durgee Junior High School.
That only helped to a point, though, as the state Class A no. 14-ranked Bees could only manage a third-place finish in Wednesday’s boys CNYCL race, earning 59 points to trail state no. 8-ranked Liverpool (52 points) for the runner-up spot as Fayetteville-Manlius, no. 2 in the state rankings, won with 41 points.
Senior Evan Biedermann led B’ville’s efforts, needing 16 minutes, 15.6 seconds to gain eighth place in an individual race where Liverpool’s Stevie Schulz (15:23.8) and Ty Brownlow (15:26.0) went 1-2 ahead of F-M’s Patrick Perry (15:35.7) in th ird place.
Right behind Biedermann, sophomore Adam Davis grabbed ninth place in 16:20.7, while senior Cameron Morrissey finished 11th in 16:25.3. Then B’ville’s main pack arrived, assuring that it would place 16 runners in the top 40 of the final standings.
Sophomore Garrett Vannatta led that pack, finishing 15th in 16:31.3 to edge junior Ben Timmons (16:31.7) in 16th place. Another 10th-grader, Joe Licameli, got 17th place in 16:33.1 to edge out senior Andrew Olds (16:33.3) in 18th place as sophomore Austin Bolton was 19th in 16:37.1.
Bees senior Evan Vannatta got to 21st place in 16:40.5. John Kresovich, in 16:42.4, held off Kieran Sheridan (16:46.9) for 24th place, with Connor McManus 27th in 16:53.7. Sam McIlroy was 31st in 17:01.7, while Jake Naples finished 34th in 17:05.4. George Kresovich (17:10.9) was two seconds ahead of Kenny Stehle (17:12.9) in 37th place.
Meanwhile, in the girls CNYCL meet, B’ville, no. 22 in the state Class A rankings, took fourth place with 92 points. Three state-ranked sides finished ahead of the Bees, with no. 1-ranked F-M on top as it set a national-best team Speed Rating, and no. 13-ranked West Genesee (64 points) beating out no. 14-ranked Liverpool (76 points) for second place.
The Hornets swept the top five individual spots, Sophie Ryan prevailing in 17:29.7, but in the race behind them B’ville sophomore Justus Holden-Betts did quite well, finishing second outside of the F-M group and seventh overall in 18 minutes, 32 seconds, behind Liverpool’s Jenna Schulz (18:15.2) in sixth place.
Another Bees sophomore, Sarah Klein, took 16th place among team runners and 8th overall, in 19:30.6. Two juniors followed, as Elizabeth Fawwaz was 20th in the team race (22nd overall) in 19:42.2 and Anna Demer finished in 19:513 to get 22nd-place team points and finish 24th overall.
B’ville’s 10th-grade group continued to excel as Leah Carpenter, in a time of 20:22.3, was 27th in the team standings and 32nd overall. Natalie Farnett (20:41.8) beat out Mia Bolton (20:43.5) for 37th place, with Nadine Dickter 41st in 20:53.3. Jenna Costello (20:59.9), Anika Archer (21:04.7) and Lyndsay Slavik (21:05.8) each had top-50 finishes.
It all served as a sneak preview to next Saturday’s Section III Class A championships, which take place at Chittenango High School. The girls Class A race starts at 1:40, with the boys Class A race starting at 2:50.
