A mere two weeks had elapsed since the Fayetteville-Manlius girls cross country team stood triumphant at the Nike Cross Nationals, victors of that prestigious event for the 10th time in 11 years.
Yet here were some of those Hornets in action again, in support of yet another winning effort for F-M’s girls indoor track team as it claimed the morning session of last Saturday’s Jack Morse Kickoff Meet at SRC Arena with 78 points, besting 12 other teams as West Genesee (59.5 points) took runner-up honors.
Claire Walters and Reilly Madsen, part of the cross-country seven that conquered the nation in Portland, Oregon, now joined Christy Berge’ and Grace Perry to run the 4×800 relay in 10 minutes, 13.38 seconds to beat Westhill-Bishop Ludden (10:24.78) by more than 11 seconds for the top spot.
Phoebe White and Sophie Ryan also kept winning, as they joined Susan Bansbach and Cady Barns in the 1,600 sprint medley relay and F-M, in 4:16.78, blew away the field, with West Genesee (4:40.93) far back in the second spot.
Barns didn’t stop there, going to the long jump and winning the individual title with a leap of 15 feet 6 ½ inches, also getting the team title with Sydney O’Dell as their leaps added up to 29’8”, just ahead of West Genesee’s 29’5 ½”.
Then, in the triple jump, Barns again was on top, going 34’7 ¾”, and won with Gwenn Shepardson with a combined 64’5”, again with the Wildcats (60’5 ¼”) trailing. O’Dell and Grace Hausladen were second (9’6”) behind Solvay (9’4”) in the high jump.
Though Rebecca Walters won the individual 1,500-meter run in 5:00.64 and Alex Villalba (5:04.03) was third, they still finished second in the relay as, with Haleigh Pascual and Keita Peden, the Hornets got 20:46.98 and West Genesee won in 20:39.67.
Shepardson won the individual 55-meter hurdles in 9.25 seconds and, with Julianna Quinones, was second (21.52 seconds) to Westhill-Ludden (21.34 seconds) on the team side. O’Dell, Chloe Bullough, Phoebe Lindabury and Abigail Zuber were second (1:57.45) to West Genesee (1:53.05) in the 4×200 relay.
Palmer Madsen, Libbie Kirkpatrick, Maggie Noel and Isabella Ruthig were fourth in the 4×400 relay in 4:44.81. Celia Woodruff and Allie Nethercott were eighth in the 55-meter dash, worth a single point.
For its part, the F-M boys indoor track team earned 56 points, finding itself in fifth place in the Morse Kickoff morning session as Tully prevailed with 74 points.
The Hornets swept the top two spots in the high jump, Romello Mitchell clearing 5’8” and Ryan Kaczorowski topping 5’6” as no one else topped 5’3”. Kaczorowski and Casey Coleman paired for second place in the triple jump with 70’5” behind Central Square’s 79’1”.
Top-five individual finishes by Eric Coley and Jacob Roberts led to a Hornets win in the 55 sprint in 13.92 seconds to second-place Corcoran’s 14.12. Roberts paired with Armando Adrian, John Nethercott and Ben Welling for fifth place in the 4×200 in 1:43.87.
Stefan Mina, Teddy Moses, Donovan Welsh and Jack Shanley ran in the 4×400 and rose to third place in 4:02.87, and F-M also was third in the sprint medley as Mina, Welsh, Peyton Burnett and Jack Duncanson got a time of 4:04.36.
Patrick Perry, Eli Capri (back from their participation in the boys Nike Nationals), Mark Hanlon and Conner Pascual were fourth in the 4×800 in 9:06.10. The Hornets were also fourth (22:03.81) in the mile relay.
Jacob Rhea earned second place in the individual shot put by throwing it 41’5 ¼”, getting to seventh place on the team side with Alex Woodruff.
