EAST SYRACUSE – Girls from East Syracuse Minoa and boys from Jamesville-DeWitt made their way to the top of the standings and earned Section III Class A championships on a rainy Friday at Spartan Stadium.
Flourishing at its home venue, ESM’s girls picked up 155.5 points, nearly double the total of runner-up Whitesboro (80), while in the boys meet the Red Rams, led by Caleb Smith, needed 140 points to finish on top as the Spartans, led again by Rocky El, were second with 101 points.
ESM’s best all-around athlete on the girls side was Arianna Brennen, who in the five-event pentathlon picked up 2,424 points to hold off Indian River’s Mackenzie Adams (2,317) and prevail. The Spartans went 1-2 in the high jump, where Rhiannon Butchko cleared 5 feet 2 inches and Akuot Kuany (5’1″) was second as Margaret Mading (4’10”) was fourth.
Kuany continued her dominance in the 100 hurdles, her time of 15.87 seconds more than a full second ahead of the field as Kaleigh Maloof finished fifth. Evani McDuffie followed by winning the 100-meter dash in 12.89 seconds, with Rylie King third in 13.09.
Moving to the 4×100 relay, McDuffie and King paired with Maloof and Sophia Jackson to prevail in 50.48 seconds, more than two seconds ahead of J-D, who had Madeline Carter, Kaitlyn Laubenstein, Maeve Murphy and Jaden Clemons-Butenko take second in 52.80. King was second in the 200-meter dash in 27.47 seconds, With McDuffie third in 27.87.
Amber Hayes capped off this effort when she ran the 400 hurdles in a top time of 1:11.14, beating out the 1:14.28 from J-D’s Brooke Hulbert as Laura Sitnik was fourth in 1:15.73.
Rachael Ladd made it to second place in the 2,000-meter steeplechase in 8:04.15 Lilia Pena got third place in the 400-meter dash in 1:03.94. Pena, Elena Vespi, Taylor Hoffman and Rachael Ladd were second in the 4×800 relay in 10:39.90, with Ladd fifth in the 1,500-meter run and Akasha Nunnally fifth in the pole vault.
Aryanna Finkelstein had a third-place shot put toss of 31’11 1/2″, with Sophia Jackson fourth in the discus by throwing it 89’11” and Kuany fifth in the long jump as Mading, in the triple jump, got second place with 34’4″ as Maloof finished third with 32’4″.
A surprising result in the 110 hurdles had El beating Parks, the top-ranked athlete in the state in that event, El going 14.50 seconds to Parks’ 14.54 as Nick Dekaney (14.73) was right behind in third place for J-D.
So began a day where El won three individual titles, plus a relay. in the 100 sprint, El’s 11.09 seconds beat out Dekaney’s 11.15 and Max MacCaull’s 11.36, with Caleb Smith fourth in 11.39 to give the Rams 18 total points in that race.
In his specialty, the triple jump, El won with a big attempt of 45’9 1/2″ as teammate Amare Withers was second in 41’1 3/4″. And in the 4×100, El, Parks, Aidan Hirt and Dan Tovar roared to a winning time of 43.51 seconds as Dekaney and MacCaull helped J-D finish third in 44.98. Hirt finished sixth in the 400 sprint.
Caleb Smith won three events to lead J-D to the top. In the 200, the Rams went 1-2-3, Caleb Smith winning in 23.41 seconds while Dekaney was second in 23.81 and MacCaull (23.89) got third place.
Smith would add a high jump title by clearing 5’10”, then pull off a victory in the long jump when he went 22’3 1/2″, well ahead of Parks’ second-place 20’7 1/2″.
The J-D boys started to make its way to the top in the first race, the 4×800, where James Hillers, Hudson Groat, Connor Clarkson and Sam Smith won in 8:20.73. Clarkson went on to take fifth place in the 1,600-meter run in 4:50.13, with Ashton Corona second in the 3,000 steeplechase in 10:45.7 as Clarkson (10:58.7) was fourth.
On his own, Sam Smith went 2:02.57 to prevail at 800 meters, with Hillers fourth in 2:09.32.
Alex Martinez was victorious at 3,200 meters, going 9:54.38 as Anthony Cawley finished fifth. Groat, Sam Smith, Brayden Rivera and Will Westpfal were second in the 4×400 relay in 3:37.43, just ahead of ESM (3:40.07) in third place.
Sean Rigdon got second place in the pentathlon, earning 2,337 points, just behind Watertown’s Tristin Clifford (2,432) as ESM had Bobby Sweeney (2,028) in third place.
Kevin Hasty was second in the shot put, heaving it 42’8 1/2″ as Andrew LaMarche was fifth, Hasty also sixth in the discus with 115’10”. Luke Mancini took third in the pole vault for the Spartans, clearing 10’6″. ESM was fourth in the 4×800 as Tovar was fifth in the 200 and Joe Pedrosa-Garcia took sixth in the 400 hurdles.
J-D’s girls finished fifth with 49 points, including a win in the 4×400, where Carter, Clemons-Butenko, Norah Kirch and Victoria Payne went 4:19.70 as ESM was fourth in 4:30.46.
Payne was second in the 400 sprint in 1:00.92 and fourth in the 200 in 28.33 seconds, while Megan O’Malley finished fourth in the steeplechase, Hailey Webber took fourth in the shot put (30’4 1/4″) and Hulbert was fifth in the high jump.
