Sachem North placed third in team scoring at the Section XI County Championship Meet held at Sunken Meadow State Park on a perfect XC running day. The weather was crisp with temperatures in the high 50s at race time. The sun picked through a mostly cloudy sky and a breeze from the northeast caused most runners to keep windbreakers on during warm-ups.
As the race started, Sachem North runners took their characteristically a-little-back-in-the pack start. The North Flaming Arrows began moving through packs as runners entered the Moat at the half mile mark. Senior Elise Ramirez was with the lead pack as the race moved into the Picnic Grounds.
Junior Mackenzie Coleman was with a large second pack. Freshman Gabriella Mott was fighting through elbows as she turned out of the Moat and headed into Snake Hill. Sophomores Krista Goodman, Amanda Carlson, Kaitlyn Licata and Kaitlyn Goodman were making their own moves as the four XC rookies showed veteran poise in their last and biggest race of their exciting fall seasons.
Sachem took a new approach to running Sunken Meadow’s tough hills in the 2014 season. The team wrote the hills off. There are 2 ½ miles of relative flat at Sunken Meadow’s toughest-in-NYS XC course. Run fast, we’ll deal with the hills, then run fast again was North’s approach to the Meadow. Sachem’s aggressive strategy paid off at Peconic (a team victory), Suffern Invitational (2nd in the “A” Race), Manhattan College (Eastern States Championship Race for the second straight year and top 25 NYS rankings for the first time in the 2014 season) and Brown (4th in the Championship Race).
Sachem flew around Belmont Lake in its first-ever race on the fast course and had many Top Times List performances on our home course. Our record at Sunken Meadow before today was also impressive. 2nd in the “A” Race at Suffolk Coaches and 2nd in the Division I Championship Race last week. Hills? To paraphrase the 1948 film The Treasure of the Sierra Madre, we don’t care about any stinkin’ hills! Our approach worked again today. The squad raced the flats aggressively. But even the hills were not safe from North’s attack today.
Sachem North runners consistently moved past rivals on hills. Elise went into Snake in pack of ten runners. She came out in third place, a spot she would not relinquish. Mackenzie moved from pack two into pack one on Snake and was in the top ten before cresting Cardiac. Gabriella is the best hill runner on our team. She passed many runners on Sunken Meadow’s two hills. The Four Super Sophs also ran strong hill sections. All raced the flats. No gaps were safe with Sachem runners on the attack today. Rival leads quickly disappeared on the downhills.
Sachem North’s race strategy was simple today – find your race, close gaps, fight off challengers on the final stretch of the course. We had a second goal – battle Northport. The defending county champions easily won the head to head battle in the Championship race at Divisions. Only Elise had beaten her Northport counterpart. Sachem’s number 2-7 runners finished behind Northport’s 2-7. But we were close enough to see Northport. Look for yellow jerseys and race. The door opened as Elise, Mackenzie and Gabriella each finished ahead of their Northport rivals. Krista, Amanda and Kaitlyn L. were edged by a collective 13 points – far better than last week’s 62 point spread. Sachem edged Northport 114-121 today.
Sachem East won the team title with 57 points. Ward Melville placed second with 87. Sachem North (114), Northport (121) and Bay Shore (164) rounded out the top five. Sachem North’s team average of 20:42 was the team’s fastest team average since the 1998 county championship team. Elise, Mackenzie and Gabriella earned All-County honors and Elise will represent Sachem North and Section XI at the NYS Championship Meet at SUNY Canton next week. North was one of only three teams (along with Sachem East and Ward Melville) to place two runners in the top ten in the Class A Race behind Elise’s third and Mackenzie’s eighth place finishes. All seven runners ran career-bests on Sunken Meadow’s course today.
At the beginning of the season, Coach Young ranked Sachem North #10 in Class A pre-season rankings. Other coaches were not polled on this ranking. It is unlikely that many coaches would have believed that a team led by three veteran All-County runners with (as things turned out) the next five runners being XC rookies would factor greatly in the post-season. Sachem North did not act like a team in a rebuilding year. Despite the loss of a talented Class of 2013 group, Sachem reloaded with an influx of talented track athletes and turned out one of the strongest seasons in program history.