Weedsport Harrier
Weedsport Harrier
October 22, 2007 Edition No. 10
The Eagle Harrier
Stanton Wins Weedsport Invite!
JV Wins Award; Varsity Battles
Weedsport, New York – It’s been a while since a J-E harrier has won an invitational. The last time this has happened was back in 2002 when a skinny sophomore named Kyle Clifford won the Junior Varsity Race at the South Jefferson Invite. Cody Stanton, a ripe old 14-years of age, captured the Junior Varsity race at Saturday’s Weedsport Invitational. Stanton won the race by an outstanding 28 seconds over Weedsport’s Zach Fied. By doing so, Stanton and the JV Squad took home the 2nd place plaque and got some well-deserved recognition. “It’s nice to see the younger guys get some recognition for their efforts” said Coach Roman, “Usually the praise goes to the Varsity Squad, but on this day it was the JV crew”. When asked about the key to his victory, Stanton replied: “I had a lot of sugar just before the race so I had lots of energy”.Senior Andy Degray, making the most of his up and down season, was J-E’s second man for the JV team, finishing in 11th place (21.59) over the 3.2 mile Weedsport Course. “I almost killed myself going down Science Hill” said Degray, I was gone after the hill”. Following two places behind Degray was sophomore Kyle Becker (13th place/22.11), running his best invitational finish of his career. “I was really fired up to run because I’ve heard nothing but razzing by my teammates for losing to Dylan Kirk last weekend in New York, I was some kind of motivated”. Sophomore George Brauchle was JE’s 4th man, and was only three places behind Becker (16th/22.26), and Dylan Kirk was J-E’s fifth man finishing 21st (22.43). Matt Sullivan was 31st (23.33) and Brendan Hogan was 44th.
The Varsity Squad for J-E ran a passionate race taking sixth overall with 171 points. There were 18 schools competing in the race which was won by Mynderse Academy with 86 points. LeRoy (95), Weedsport (99), Addison (157), Midlakes (163) were the 2nd through 5th placed schools.
Leading J-E was junior Jeff Donohue who was 15th overall in the race. “The course was so sloppy” said Donohue, “I tried to run down Science Hill as hard as I could”. “I passed about five kids going down, but I was so out-of-control at the bottom, that they all passed me back”. Mike Marrero was J-E’s second man on Saturday for the first time in his career finishing in 30th place (20.02). Kyle Merrill and Donato Direnzo were J-E’s 3rd and 4th runners finishing 38th and 39th respectively (20.28 and 20.36). Shelby Brayton was J-E’s fifth scorer finishing 51st (21.02), just three places ahead of fellow senior Kyle Bard (21.08). Jake Griffin was 77th (22.22).
“We really got out hard today and competed early on” said Coach Roman, “we were winning the race at the mile”. J-E nearly beat a state-ranked squad as N.Y. State’s 9th-ranked class D school, Addison, was only 14 points ahead of the Eagles. Weedsport, the state’s # 6-ranked class D school,l was well ahead of the Eagles (72 points). “We competed, we ran hard, and the boys should be happy with their races” as this was a tough, tough race, much tougher than last year when we won” added Roman.