The Harwood cross-country team had their first race of the season on Saturday, September 3, at the Essex Invitational. The girls come into the season having won seven consecutive Division II state championships, while the boys have won six of the last eight. “We have 76 kids on the team this year, which is over 10 percent of the student population,” said coach John Kerrigan before the race. “I think that says something about the success of our program.”
In her first high school 5K race, ninth-grader Julianne Young was the first Highlander of the season to cross the finish line, impressing the crowd with a second-place finish, with a time of 21:36.6 in the girls’ junior varsity race. Following behind her with a strong showing was freshman Willa Yonkman in 16th place (23:20.7). Rounding out the top five JV girls were sophomores Hanna Clark (40th), Ciara Mead (59th) and Anna Schmeltzer (64th).
In the boys’ junior varsity, 10th-grader Brendan Magill raced to an 11th-place finish at 18:52.0. He was followed by junior Seth Beard (20th), seniors Chris Cahalan (22nd) and Riley Powell (23rd) and junior Cam Alberghini (50th).
“To have such strong performances by underclassmen in the JV races bodes well for our program,” Kerrigan said. “Julianne Young showed some great poise out there today; the pack went out fast, but she ran her race and just picked them off one at a time to finish in second place. And Willa [Yonkman] showed she is going to be a strong competitor as well.”
In the varsity races, the girls were led to a fourth-place finish by junior Erin Magill’s second-place finish (19:32.2). She was followed by senior Anneka Williams (9th), junior Phoebe Sweet (23nd), senior Lily Clark (37th) and junior Katie Ferguson (44th).
The boys’ varsity finished fifth, led by senior Noah Eckstein’s fifth-place finish (16:55.4), followed by juniors Daniel Bevacqui (18th) and Anthony Palmerio (34th) and seniors Colin Fennelly (36th) and Tristian Touchette (52nd).
“The varsity teams showed today that they are ready to run,” said Kerrigan. “Most of the teams here today are Division I schools, much larger then Harwood. I like to call it ‘running with the Big Dogs,’ and we really showed them that the Highlanders are no Shetland ponies.”
When it was pointed out that he had mixed his metaphors, Kerrigan laughed and said, “Whatever, the kids ran great today.”
This week the Highlanders will be racing at coach Kerrigan’s home high school in Port Jefferson, New York. When questioned as to why he was taking the team to Long Island for a race he said, “If you want to run with the big dogs (better competitors) you have to get out from under the porch (rural Vermont)."
