SYRACUSE – For more than two months, the Baldwinsville boys indoor track and field team had racked up victories, turning back whatever competition was put in front of them.
It was no different Thursday night at SRC Arena, the Bees never letting anyone get close to them and winning the Section III Class AA championship with a total of 171 points, more than double what runner-up Cicero-North Syracuse (77 points) managed.
Leading the Bees’ distance runners, Solomon Holden-Betts went two minutes, 31.80 seconds in the 1,000-meter run to crack the national top 25 in this race, with Paul Clark fourth in 2:34.15.
Then, in the 1,600, Holden-Betts went 4:24.90 to beat Fayetteville-Manlius’ Anthony Otis (4:27.34) for the top spot, and he capped his day by helping Ryan Wilson, Jack McAllister and Jeff Ragonese win the 4×800 relay in 8:19.83 to F-M’s 8:27.03.
Earlier, in the 3,200-meter run, Noah Covert prevailed, needing a personal-best 9:52.61 to hold off Auburn’s Owen Gasper (9:54.49), with Wilson fourth in 10:02.75.
Moving to the 600-meter run, B’ville went 1-2-3 as McAllister won in 1:25.96, edging Logan Hayes’ 1:26.12 and Ragonese’s 1:26.64. But it was Hayes winning the 300-meter dash in 36.55 seconds, just ahead of Brandon Levin’s second-place 36.81.
Hayes, McAllister, Zach Arria and Kyle Sheckler went 3:35.74 to win the 4×400 relay over C-NS’s 3:39.37 before Sheckler, in the pole vault, prevailed by topping 12 feet as Dylan Wertheim was second with 10 feet and Grayson Brady (8’6″) was fourth.
Jackson Creelman got third place in the 55-meter hurdles in 8.47 seconds, with Logan Zapf eighth. David Dobrowolski had a second-place weight throw of 50’2 1/4″, with Dimitri Ioannidis fourth (42’8 1/2″) and Nick Foster fifth (42’7 3/4″) as Auburn’s Dustin Swartwood put up a 70’3″ that landed him in the national top 10.
Also, Dobrowolski threw the shot put 42’3 1/4″ to finish third as Dimitri Ioannidis was fifth (39’9 3/4″) and Gibson Boudov (38’9 1/4″) seventh, while Logan Zapf was second in the triple jump with 40’1″ behind the 40’6 1/2″ from F-M’s Jackson Burton.
Levin, in 6.79, edged Kaleb Paul (6.81) for fifth place in the 55-meter dash as Paul, Arria, Griffin Killian and Anthony Noda were fourth in the 4×200 relay in 1:37.61, Killian topping 5’8″ for fourth place in the high jump and Levin sixth (19’8″) in the long jump.
Meanwhile, B’ville’s girls indoor track team earned 46 points in its sectional Class AA meet, gaining fourth place. C-NS (165.5 points) ran away with the title as Liverpool was second and Rome Free Academy third.
That included another victory from Sydney McKenney in the pole vault. McKenney cleared 11 feet to place herself in the state top 10 of the event, two feet ahead of RFA’s Katherine DeHimer in second as Kelsey Dwyer was third, topping 8’6″.
Over on the oval, B’ville won the 4×400 relay as Mia Pozzi, Clare Horan, Avamarie Davis and Madison Kennedy combined to post 4:14.55 and beat out C-NS’s 4:16.71. Kennedy later finished fourth in the 300 in 44.06 seconds, with Pozzi (44.90) seventh.
Julianna Gingrich threw the shot put 32’5 3/4″, second only to Liverpool’s Allie Cary (36’1″). Kamryn Barton was fifth in the 1,000 in 3:12.49 and helped Sophia Cavalieri, Mary Sabatino and Yolanda Wei got third in the 4×800 in 10:15.18.
McKenney took seventh in the 55 hurdles in 9.60 seconds and tied for seventh in the high jump (4’6″) as Anaiya Johnson was eighth and Pozzi ninth in the 55 sprint.
