A violent thunderstorm hit Canastota High School on Thursday night, just as the Section III Class B-2 boys track and field championships were nearing its conclusion, forcing the cancellation of the final event, the high jump.
By then, though, the outcome was long settled, at least on the team side. The Cazenovia Lakers had engineered a man-made storm that overwhelmed eight challengers and led to a sectional banner.
All told, Cazenovia had 151 points, more than doubling the total of runner-up Hannibal, who had 72 points. Jordan-Elbridge (67.5 points) edged Clinton (66) and host Canastota (65) for third place.
At the heart of the Lakers’ effort was its dominance in field events, where it was first or second in every completed event, starting with Sam DeLeon clearing 13 feet in the pole vault, winning that event as Dalton Sevier topped 10’6″ for fourth place.
Slater DeLeon was victorious in the long jump, going 20’6 1/4″ to beat out Jordan-Elbridge’s Marion Quigley (20’2 1/4″) as Ray Satchwell was fourth with 19’11” before he earned second place in the triple jump with 41’10”, ahead of DeLeon (39’7″) in fifth place.
Angelo Annotto, throwing the shot put 41’9″, beat out Hannibal’s Hunter Donhauser (41’2″) for the top spot, Annotto also finishing second in the discus with 124’2″ behind Donhauser (132 feet) as Gordan Wester was sixth with 111’9″ and Kyler Hathaway (92’9″) was ninth.
The first win on the track came in the 4×100 relay, where Slater DeLeon, Justin Gagnon, Josh Maxwell and Sam DeLeon went 45.21 seconds to beat Canastota (46.27) by more than a second. Then Andrew Kent went 800 meters in 2:03.11 to hold off Clinton’s Kass Gifford (2:04.77), while Hunter McCullough got sixth place in 2:14.71.
Slater DeLeon, in 23.35 seconds, was a close second to J-E’s Marion Quigley (23.31) in the 200-meter dash, with Sam DeLeon 10th. Jack Aronson went 53.75 seconds in the 400-meter dash to take third place as Cormac Race (53.98) was fifth.
Aronson and McCullough were joined by two freshmen, Mike Senehi and Andrew Kent, as the Lakers were second in the 4×800 relay in 8:59.97 to J-E’s 8:44.49. Aronson, Kent, Cormac Race and Alex Lansing were third in the 4×400 relay in 3:47.31.
Sam DeLeon got third place in the 100-meter dash in 12.03 seconds, beating out Gagnon (12.11), who was fourth. Gagnon got third place in the 110 high hurdles in 16.19 seconds, with Maxwell (17.62) sixth, Gagnon also finishing third in the 400 hurdles in 1:01.39 as Connor Wilson (1:04.07) was seventh.
Jared Smith ran the mile in 4:52.13, with Senehi seventh in 5:04.53 as he also got seventh place in the 3,000-meter steeplechase. Six more points came from the pentathlon, where Jason Olkowski, with 2,055 points, got fourth place and Justin Ossont was fifth with 1,960 points.
