Though only a junior, Jamesville-DeWitt girls track and field standout Alexandria Payne has already made plenty of history for the Red Rams program, but nothing bigger than what she accomplished last weekend in the New York State Public High School Athletic Association championship meet at Union-Endicott.
Payne earned the Division I (large school) state title in the five-event pentathlon, and nearly won the overall title, too, while Fayetteville-Manlius saw its girls 4×800 team prevail and Christian Brothers Academy had some top efforts in the Division II (small school) portion.
To get started in the pentathlon, Payne ran the 100-meter hurdles in 15.02 seconds and cleared 5 feet 2 ¼ inches in the high jump. Following a shot put toss of 30’10 ¼”, Payne went 16’3” in the long jump and ran 800 meters in 2:24.86.
That added up to 3,351 points, which allowed Payne to edge New Rochelle’s Olivia Morgan (3,319 points) for the Division I title, while in the overall event she was just behind South Seneca’s Emily Lavarnway, who with 3,363 points prevailed over Payne by 12 points.
On that same Saturday, F-M took over in the 4×800 relay. The quartet of Phoebe White, Palmer Madsen, Sophie Ryan and Rebecca Walters finished in eight minutes, 56.41 seconds to pull away from Bronxville (8:58.80) for the overall title. In Division I, the Hornets beat runner-up John Jay-Cross River (9:00.31) by nearly four seconds.
Claire Walters broke the seven-minute mark in the 2,000-meter steeplechase, finishing fifth in 6:58 flat as Alex Harris (North Rockland) won in 6:45.28. White was seventh in the Division I 800-meter run (ninth overall) in 2:11.39, while Ryan finished 12th in the 3,000-meter run in 10:17.17 Gwenn Shepardson was 15th in the 100-meter hurdles in 16.92 seconds.
F-M also had, on the boys side, Patrick Perry reach the medal podium in the mile, where his time of 4:20.29 put him in sixth place in Division I as Kevin Moshier (Corning) won in 4:12.81. Joe Walters was 15th in the 3,200-meter run in 9:43.72 as Perry, Jack Boltman, Garrett Brennan and Jack Duncanson were ninth in the 4×800 in 8:03.20.
Moving to Division II, CBA’s Olivia Morganti was part of a 1-2 Section III finish in the 2,000-meter steeplechase. Morganti finished in seven minutes, 10.16 seconds, which was runner-up in Division II behind Tully eighth-grader Brooke Rauber, who won in 7:01.26.
Dominic Morganti competed in the boys 3,200 and was fourth in a time of 9:37.82, with Ryan Gallagher (Briarcliff) prevailing in 9:13.57. Claire Bargabos, by going 58.63 seconds in the girls 400-meter dash, improved on her best time of the spring by more than a second and finished 12th in Division II.
