STATEN ISLAND – From Sam Mellinger in the sprints to Solomon Holden-Betts in distance runs, the Baldwinsville boys indoor track and field team was well-represented in last Saturday’s New York State Public High School Athletic Association championships at Staten Island’s Ocean Breeze Complex.
Yet none of the Bees’ entries would do as well as the 4×400 relay team that would make it to the medal podium after two superb performances.
Logan Hayes, Owen Weaver and Jack McAllister joined Mellinger as B’ville went three minutes, 28.36 seconds to qualify third among 21 entrants and reach the championship round.
There, the Bees fell off a bit, to 3:31.68, but still took seventh place overall and finished fifth in the public-school division as Washingtonville won both the NYSPHSAA and Federation events in 3:24.16.
As for Holden-Betts, he took part in the 1,600-meter run, where he had gone 4:27 flat this winter and was the no. 19 seed. Here, Holden-Betts did even better, his swift 4:22.71 putting him 10th overall and sixth in the NYSPHSAA division won by Corning’s Ashton Bange in 4:18.10.
Mellinger hoped to reach the final of the 55-meter dash. Seeded 12th at 6.54 seconds, the Bees’ senior could only go 6.68 in his heat and finished 19th, when it took 6.59 to reach the finals won by Shenendehowa’s Carter Cukerstein in a meet-record time of 6.28.
