Pierson Girls Cross Country Places Sixth in the State; Gardner Has Best State Performance Yet

It was a successful trip to the New York State Cross Country Championships for the Pierson girls team and junior Justin Gardner.

The Pierson girls placed sixth in their Class D 5K race at Vernon Verona Sherrill High School just outside Syracuse, which they were able to compete in by winning their fourth consecutive county title two weeks ago. The girls had achieved sixth place in past state races, but as head coach Jim Kinnier pointed out, that was when there were seven or eight teams in the race. This year, there were 10 teams competing, therefore Kinnier considers it the best performance by any Pierson girls team at states.

Kinnier thought his team had what it took to defeat Delhi, which finished just above the Whalers in fifth place, but even so, they topped expectations, coming into the race ranked seventh.

Pierson seventh-grader Josephine Mott finished the girls Class D 5K race in 21:02.9, which placed her 14th overall out of 107 runners, earning Second Team All-State honors.

“Really an impressive race,” Kinnier said of Mott’s performance. “And she really worked her way up. Early in the race, she wasn’t 14th, she was much further down. But she really worked her way up. With about a mile to go, maybe three-quarters of a mile, she was 15th and then picked up another placement. That’s her best time by about 40, 50 seconds. Very impressive.”

Kinnier said he was pleased with the girls overall and it wasn’t all that surprising that they beat projections.

“When they do these projections they use a lot of averages,” he explained. “Because we’re so young, we have a lot of first-year runners, and so their performances early in the year were less than stellar, which is not a criticism of them, it’s just what happens with newer runners. But they progressed throughout the season.”

Gardner, meanwhile, was the lone boy representing the Whalers upstate, and he found his fair share of success as well. He finished the boys Class D 5K race in a personal best 18:02.8, which placed him 26th overall out of 114 runners. His finish was considerably better than his 52nd finish at states a year ago and 10 placements higher than he was expected going into this year’s race.

Gardner said the race was really fun. He was a bit nervous going into it being that it had rained considerably the day before, but course conditions were better than expected. Gardner missed earned All-State honors by six placements, which were only separated by less than 10 seconds.

“I had a great race. I felt good,” he said. “I was hoping to get my personal best, which I did. I was also hoping to possibly make All-State, but I fell a couple places short of that. But I got closer than I thought I would.

“I’m definitely hoping to improve some more next year, and I’ll definitely be hoping to make All-State,” Gardner added. “And, hopefully, we’ll be able to bring the whole team up to states. That would be the best scenario.”

Pierson boys head coach Joe Amato said it was an outstanding race by Gardner and he’s excited to see what’s in store for him next year as a senior.

“He’s an extremely disciplined and focused athlete,” he said. “He can continue to improve. I hope that he cuts his placement by half again next year. If he improves that much, he can be All-State. I don’t want to put too much pressure on him, but that’s a good goal for him.”

Sophomore Greylynn Guyer and freshman Sara O’Brien were the next two Pierson girls to cross the finish line together in their race after Mott, in 22:06.9 and 22:07.1, which placed them 39th and 40th, respectively. Sophomore Bennett Greene placed 79th in 24:42.6 and seventh-grader Maggie Greenwald finished 82nd in 24:46.4.

Kinnier gave credit to Port Jefferson sophomore Gwen Connelly for finishing ahead of both Guyer and O’Brien, something she hadn’t done in a while, although she was projected to do so. He also gave credit to race officials and Vernon Verona Sherrill High School for improving course conditions after the prior day’s rain.

That brings a close to the end of what was another successful cross country season for both boys and girls. O’Brien is the only one of the bunch expected to run both winter and spring track, which she’ll do for East Hampton. Gardner plays baseball in the spring and will use the winter to prepare for that.

Kinnier has an extremely young team on his hands, one that could continue its county-title run going for quite some time, but he said it’s going to take some work.

“I’m hoping they all run track because without track it’s really hard to compete,” he said. “Josie is a unique situation because as a girl, as you get older, it gets harder and there’s more competition. She had this lightning-bolt rise, but she’s going to have to go higher than this if she wants to keep progressing and it takes a lot more work.”