Christian Brothers Academy, ranked No. 1 in New Jersey and No. 9 nationally, the NJ No. 2 Union Catholic girls, Jimmy Wischusen of Union Catholic, and the Westfield boys and the Haddonfield girls stole the show with huge statement victories to highlight a dominating performance by the Garden State at the Bowdoin Park Classic on Saturday in Wappingers Falls, N.Y.
CBA, in the first of many showdowns this season with NJ No. 2/US No. 13 Union Catholic, solidified their lofty ranking with a remarkable race as the Colts finished 2-4-10-12-13 and averaged 16:26 on the rugged 3.1-mile layout, on the way to a 41-98 victory in the Division 2 race over UC, the defending Meet of Champions winner.
CBA's tight and deep pack put its seven runners in front of UC's No. 3 runner and had a 1-5 spread of 43 seconds and a 1-7 compression of 51 seconds, including a gap of just 13 seconds between their 3-7 runners. The 16:25 average by CBA makes this team the fourth fastest in school history on this course, trailing only the 16:14.6 run in 2012, the 16:15.0 in 2013, and the 16:24.6 by the 2011 team. The 2011 squad won the Nike National Championship.
The top seven for CBA were Nick Sullivan, second in 16:00.7, Joe Barrett, fourth in 16:07, Lucas Ward, 10th in 16:38, Alex Kemp, 12th in 16:39, Jack Falkowski, 13th in 16:43, Zach Shroba, 15th in 16:43, and Ryan Schmitt, 17th in 16:51.
CBA coach Sean McCafferty was very happy with his his pack executed the race plan.
Wischusen, a junior at UC who is the favorite to win the M of C title this season, opened his season with a very controlled and impressive victory in 15:54.2, the ninth fastest time by a NJ runner in course history. Led by Wischusen, UC averaged 16:50.
The top girls performance of the day was delivered by Union Catholic, who steamrolled its way to a 20-91 victory over Bronxville (N.Y) in the Division 2 race. Ridgewood was third with 95. Union Catholic also came out on top in the team merge, 39-49, over NJ No. 1 Haddonfield.
UC, led by junior Peyton Hollis (first in a school record 18:51.5) finished 1-2-3-5-10 and averaged a school record 19:42! The scorers for UC behind Hollis were Kaleigh Gunsiorowski, who recovered from a fall and still finished second in 19:13, Courtney Kaiser, third in 19:31, Ella Solorzano, fifth in 20:05, and Victoria Urbaez, 10th in 20:52.
The No. 1 ranked Haddonfield girls also threw down a strong race when the Dawgs went 3-6-7-8-9 and averaged 20:05 en route to a 28-72 win over New Milford, in the Division 1 competition. Haddonfield's scorers were Helene Usher, third in 19:39, Ava Thomas, sixth in 19:57, Riley Slootsky, seventh in 20:12, Riley Austin eighth in 20:14, and Audrey Naticchia, ninth in 20:20.
In the boys Division 1 race, NJ No. 3 Westfield rolled to a 47-70 victory over No. 4 Haddonfield. Summit was fourth at 106.
Westfield averaged 16:54 and had a remarkable 1-5 compression of just 13 seconds. Westfield's first five were Graham Korins, fourth in 16:48, Daniel Cortese, seventh in 16:52, Ryan Daly, 10th in 16:56, Avery Keith, 11th in 16:57, and Jonathan Scalia, 15th in 17:01.
Haddonfield was led by George Andrus, who placed second in 16:02.9, just behind Adam Furman of Tri-Valley, first in 16:02.3.