Fayetteville-Manlius track teams earn wins at sectional meet

BALDWINSVILLE – Asking the Fayetteville-Manlius track and field teams to rise up past the established regular-season powers in Wednesday’s Section III Class AA championships at Baldwinsville proved too much of an ask.
However, the Hornets did enough to pick up 80 points and take third place on the girls side behind Cicero-North Syracuse (178) and Rome Free Academy (131), with the boys getting 60.5 points for fourth place, just 2.5 behind second-place C-NS but well back of the host Bees, who won with 168 points.
Ceding territory to the Northstars in distance races, F-M still got a win in the girls 3,000-meter run when Izzie Sullivan went nine minutes, 43.24 seconds to pull away from C-NS’s Kate Putman (9:56.39) and prevail.
And in the 4×800 relay, F-M’s quartet of Debbie Lucchetti, Isabella Adrian, Amelia Amack and Maria Khalifeh put up a top time of 9:33.46, pulling away from C-NS (9:50.46) and the field.
In field events, Wren Usiatynski was tops in the pole vault, clearing 10 feet as only B’ville’s Sydney McKenney, topping 9 feet, was close.
Hannah Kaercher got second place in the 1,500-meter run in 4:30.25 to the 4:28.33 from C-NS’s Hannah Boyle as Amack was fourth in 4:54.85. Kaercher, Khalifeh, Adrian and Maya McKenzie were second (4:11.86) to the Northstars (4:08.32) in the 4×400 relay.
Natalee Barber earned third place in the 100-meter hurdles in 16.14 seconds and had a third-place long jump of 16’5”, with McKenzie third in the 100-meter dash in 13.26 and Lucchetti third in the 2,000-meter steeplecahse in 7:49.40.
Brigid Teaken contended in the five-event pentathlon, her total of 2,203 points good for third place, not far from the winning 2,395 from C-NS’s Morgan Hayes as she won both the shot put and 800-meter events.
In the boys sectional AA meet, F-M’s Connor Ball continued his win streak in the 400-meter hurdles, prevailing in 59.34 seconds to hold off Henninger’s Malik Egerton (1:00.05) for the top spot.
Denim Hall contended in the high jump, clearing 6’1” as Trevor Krukin tied for fifth with 5’10”. RFA’s Ed Rakowski won with a clearance of 6’6”.
Trevor Krukin, Ben Perry, Nolan McGinn and Will Seamans were second in the 4×800 in 8:07.86 to B’ville’s swift 7:58.87. McGinn went on to take second in the 3,200-meter run in 9:42.65, just behind the 9:41.14 from Liverpool’s Ryan Hagan.
Seamans went 4:28.47 in the 1,600-meter run, also second to Hagan (4:24.01) as Anthony Otis was third in 4:30.34. Hagan claimed the 800, too, to sweep all three individual distance races as Daniel Patrick took third in the 3,000-meter steeplechase in 10:28.70.
Cooper Dereszynski made his way to fourth place in the pentathlon, earning 2,230 points. The Hornets finished sixth in the 4×100 relay in 45.54 seconds.