CENTRAL NEW YORK – Just because a long-time coach has stepped aside doesn’t mean that the Cazenovia girls cross country team stopped knowing how to win both inside and outside league circles.
Sara McDowell was given the coaching task of continuing what Kurt Wheeler built with the Lakers program, and in her first OHSL Liberty division meet Wednesday at Cortland’s Gutchess Park Cazenovia dominated against Jordan-Elbridge, beating the Eagles 17-46 in a meet held
A top-three sweep was led by Lily Kogut, who finished in 20 minutes 51 seconds just ahead of the second-place 20:53 from Abbie Comeau as Maeve McGreevey finished third in 21:57.
Leading a second group of Lakers, Izzy Stromer-Galley finished fifth and Avery Cashatt got sixth place, each of them going 23:07, while Haylee Stearns was seventh in 23:25 and Gwen Livingston (23:29) was eighth.
Nearly identical scores marked the boys meet between Cazenovia and J-E that went 18-45 in the Lakers’ favor and was dominated by Jake Woolbert, whose 16:19 was nearly two minutes clear of the second-place 17:59 from Kooper Wilmot.
Nolan Campagna finished fourth, in 18:49, with Will Galton going exactly 19 minutes for fifth place to edge Owen Woodworth’s 19:03 for sixth place. Alex Neis was eighth in 19:10 and Henri Mongeau (19:25) was ninth.
This strong performance was followed by another in Saturday’s Baldwinsville Invitational where in the Small School division the girls Lakers finished fifth out of 23 teams and the boys were ninth in a large 38-team field.
Woolbert contended for the individual boys title, tearing to a time of 16:36.7 on the Durgee Junior High School course that put him fourth among more than 300 runners and not far from Chenango Valley’s Michael Doyle who won in 16:21.3.
Behind him, Wilmot finished 55th among team runners in 19:11.5, with Evan Molloy posting 19:24.2 and Campagna going 19:43.2. Will Galton’s time of 20:03.6 closed out the team portion.
Comeau led the Cazenovia girls, her time of 20:42.8 12th among team runners and 15th overall. Kogut went 22:06.7 to finish 21st in the team event and McGreevey was 29th (22:45.2) in those same standings ahead of Cashatt’s 24:33 flat and Livingston going 24:57.8.
