ONONDAGA COUNTY – Over a stretch of nine days late in September the Liverpool and Cicero-North Syracuse cross country teams would both clash head-to-head with Baldwinsville and, in between, compete in the Bees’ own invitational meet.
In the Northstars’ case, it marked a big development to have its boys team defeat the Bees 24-33 Wednesday at Oneida Shores after years of B’ville dominating this particular series.
And it started at the front, where Rhett Andrews, in 17 minutes 13.9 seconds, pulled away to win the individual title and Tyler Graham was second in 17:35.1 ahead of the 17:50.8 from the Bees’ Jacob Guelli.
Further depth was provided by Jack Putman getting fourth in exactly 18 minutes and Nolan Zinsmeyer finishing fifth in 18:03 flat. B’ville got the next five spots before Dominic Petrera clinched it for C-NS, going 18:42.7.
By that exact same 24-33 score, the C-NS girls defeated B’ville, featuring a close individual race where Gabby Putman needed exactly 19:46 to hold off the 19:49.8 from the Bees’ Kamryn Barton and 19:55.9 from Madelyn Donhauser.
Kennedy Jones, fourth in 20:20.2, led a string that included Cameron Sisk (20:34.5) edging Katy Harbold (20:35.2), while Mya Patti finished ninth in 20:40.3 and Sophia Graham (20:48.5) rounded out the top 10.
Liverpool had its league opener last Tuesday at Long Branch Park against West Genesee and Syracuse West, sweeping both sides of both races.
Meanwhile, Liverpool beat West Genesee 21-34 while sweeping Syracuse West 15-50 led by Joshua Vang, whose time of 17:34.2 was well clear of the 17:58.1 from Mason Dineen.
Brian Juston, in 17:59.7, completed a top-three Liverpool sweep in front of WG’s David Petrus (18:33.1), while Jackson Allen finished sixth in 18:42.5 and Michael Hoey (18:56.6) was ninth.
Over in the girls race, it was closer, but Liverpool won 25-30 largely because it had a 1-2 individual finish from Taylor Page, who prevailed in 19:21.9, and Kaitlyn Hotaling, easily taking second in 19:42.6.
Still, the third through fifth runners had to reach the top 10, and did so starting with Rose Piorkowski getting fifth place in 21:18 flat. Katie Martin’s 21:29.9 edged out WG’s Claire Griffin (21:31.0) for seventh-place points and Paige Baker clinched it by running to 10th place in 21:34.4.
Both Liverpool and C-NS then made their way to Saturday’s Baldwinsville Invitational here the girls Northstars would finish second with 68 points behind Auburn’s winning 42 and the Warriors were fifth.
Individually, the best finish came from Hotaling as she made her way to fourth place in 18:56.2 three spots ahead of Gabby Putman’s seventh-place 19:22.3 as Jones was ninth in 19:56.8.
Harbold ran well, too, getting to 13th place in 20:10.9, just ahead of Patti’s 15th-place 20:14.3 and Sophia Graham (20:57.1) in 24th place. Martin gave Liverpool a 20th-place clocking of 20:42.8, with Piorkowski (21:04.7) one spot ahead of Maggie Sherlock’s 21:05 flat as Kailyn Barth posted 21:53.7.
C-NS’s boys team was third with 121 points, trailing the same B’ville side (103 points) it beat earlier in the week as Liverpool took seventh in the 16-team field.
Vang led the Warriors, claiming 10th place in 16:57.3, but no other Liverpool runner finished in the top 40. Four did for the Northstars, with Zinsmeyer 12th in 16:58.9 and Andrews 14th in 17:09.6. Tyler Graham went 17:18.3 for 18th place and Petrera needed exactly 18 minutes for 29th place.
