It fell to the West Genesee cross country teams to offer the introductory note for the 2018 season in the ultra-competitive Salt City Athletic Conference Metro division.
The Wildcats would take on Baldwinsville last Thursday afternoon in conditions far more palatable than the day before, when a heat index that soared past 100 degrees forced a postponement.
Even so, the Bees won both sides of the meet, with the girls race a lot closer as WG had five of the top nine finishers, but were stymied near the top in a 24-31 defeat.
Hannah Craybas finished in 21 minutes, 34.6 seconds, which gave her runner-up honors as B’ville’s Justus Holden-Betts prevailed in a clocking of 21:13 flat.
However, the Bees solidified its margin when Annabelle Horan (21:38.2) and Olivia Creelman (21:38.7) finished ahead of WG’s Mia Mitchell, who settled for fifth place in 21:40.1.
Natalie Buckhout, in 22:01.4, beat out Liz Morey (22:24.8) and Kendall Dombroske (22:30.1) for seventh place, but Leah Carpenter (21:56.6) was sixth to clinch it for the Bees.
Meanwhile, WG’s boys team lost to B’ville 20-41 despite Matt Bartolotta’s individual victory. In a time of 17:33.1, Bartolotta pulled well clear of the Bees’ Conor McManus (17:47.4) in the runner-up spot.
Graye Mehl finished in 18:45.9, but McManus and other Bees beat that mark, Sam Kellner was third in 18:01.4. Adam Davis had a fourth-place time of 18:06.2 as Colin Delaney rolled to fifth place in 18:39.2. John Arvantides needed exactly 18:44 to beat Mehl for sixth place.
From there, WG went to Saturday’s Chittenango Invitational and won the Varsity 3 race on the girls side with 55 points to 77 for runner-up Hilton as Marcellus finished fourth with 177 points.
Faith Knox led the Wildcats with a seventh-place time of 21:20.4, Mitchell got eighth place in 21:27.1 and Natalie Buckhout gained 11th place in 21:44.6.
Olivia Lockwood was 13th in the team standings in 21:52.1 as Morey took 16th place in 22:25.5. Abby Kuppinger (22:33.9) and Craybas (22:36.0) were close behind.
Moving to Marcellus, Madeline Caron was 27th in a time of 23:11.7. Carolyn Carlic took 31st place in 23:43 flat. Violet Grieb (23:54.5) was 34th, ahead of Virginia Lucchetti (24:05.5), Brielle McShane (24:10.3), Heidi Steigerwald (25:07.3) and Alyssa McShane (25:46.3).
In the boys Varsity 3 race, Bartolotta was second in 16:47.9, behind only Adirondack’s Tyler Fauvelle (16:35.2) as WG, with 100 points, was second to New Hartford (73 points), barely ahead of Marcellus, who was third with 109 points.
Mehl went 18:32.3 for 11th place in the team standings, with James Alberts (19:33.5) edging Luke Mullane (19:35.5) for 28th place and Joe Parisi 30th in 19:35.9, ahead of Nick Mulderig (19:56.3) and Aiden Walsh (20:46.0).
Nick Roseboom paced Marcellus, his eighth-place time of 18:22.1 inches ahead of Aiden Shea, ninth in 18:22.4. Kyle Stottlar was 21st for the Mustangs in 19:15.2 as Grayson Roag posted 19:39 flat. Kevin Huss (20:02.3), Charles Donovan (20:40.3) and Thomas Hoey (20:50.0) followed, all in the top 60 of the team standings.
Up in Varsity 1 at Chittenango, Jordan-Elbridge finished sixth out of 15 teams with some consistency from all of its runners as Sean Dristle finished 20th on the team side in a clocking of 18:04.1.
Derek Quigley, who was 39th in 18:47.8, was two spots ahead of Kenny Williams (18:53.9) in the team event, while Logan Kinney finished in 19:14 flat. Lee Jewell, in 19:49.4, was ahead of Colin Jewsbury (20:25.3) and Matt Sheldon (20:25.7).
Finishing 14th out of 17 teams in girls Varsity 1, J-E’s girls were led by the 23:54.3 posted by Hannah Fichter, which put her just ahead of Vassianna Klock (24:01.5) as Madison Daly finished in 25:16.4.
