Hampshire Regional boys cross country wins Class B title at Western Massachusetts Championships (PHOTOS)

PVCICS’ Grafton Tolopko runs to an eighth-place finish in the boys race at the Western Mass. Class B Cross Country Championships on Sunday at Stanley Park in Westfield.

PVCICS’ Grafton Tolopko runs to an eighth-place finish in the boys race at the Western Mass. Class B Cross Country Championships on Sunday at Stanley Park in Westfield. STAFF PHOTO/JEFF LAJOIE

Hampshire Regional’s Oscar Schiff (center) moves through the course at Stanley Park in Westfield during the Western Mass. Class B Cross Country Championships on Sunday. Schiff finished sixth and the Raiders won the boys team title for the first time in Hampshire Regional history.

Hampshire Regional’s Oscar Schiff (center) moves through the course at Stanley Park in Westfield during the Western Mass. Class B Cross Country Championships on Sunday. Schiff finished sixth and the Raiders won the boys team title for the first time in Hampshire Regional history. STAFF PHOTO/JEFF LAJOIE

Hampshire Regional’s Charlotte Niswonger and Ada Corner move through the course at the Western Mass. Class B Cross Country Championships on Sunday at Stanley Park in Westfield.

Hampshire Regional’s Charlotte Niswonger and Ada Corner move through the course at the Western Mass. Class B Cross Country Championships on Sunday at Stanley Park in Westfield. STAFF PHOTO/JEFF LAJOIE

Hampshire Regional’s Kathleen Barry runs to a second place finish in the girls race at the Western Mass. Class B Cross Country Championships on Sunday at Stanley Park in Westf

Hampshire Regional’s Kathleen Barry runs to a second place finish in the girls race at the Western Mass. Class B Cross Country Championships on Sunday at Stanley Park in Westf STAFF PHOTO/JEFF LAJOIE

Hopkins Academy’s Caprial DiBartolomeo runs to a 16th-place finish in the girls race at the Western Mass. Class B Cross Country Championships on Sunday at Stanley Park in Westfield.

Hopkins Academy’s Caprial DiBartolomeo runs to a 16th-place finish in the girls race at the Western Mass. Class B Cross Country Championships on Sunday at Stanley Park in Westfield. STAFF PHOTO/JEFF LAJOIE

By GARRETT COTE

Staff Writer

Published: 10-27-2024 12:44 PM

WESTFIELD — Sue Tracy wore the biggest smile as she wiped tears from her eyes underneath the Hampshire Regional cross country tent on the outskirts of Stanley Park’s cross country course.

For the first time in program history, the Raiders boys team won a Western Mass. championship, posting 75 points – four better than second-place Mount Greylock – en route to the Class B sectional crown on a sun-filled Sunday morning.

“We knew this was gonna be an awesome race, and so many teams were evenly matched,” Tracy said. “We came in knowing it was anyone’s race to win, depending on who could pull it together. We were hopeful we could pull out a win, but knew we could fall as far down as fourth because of the close matchup. I’m super stoked we came out on top.”

Over the 15 years that Tracy has been with the Hampshire program, the boys team fell just shy of a title on numerous occasions. The Raiders have had top teams year-in and year-out, they’ve fielded several individual Western Mass. champions and have even been runners-up as a team a few times. To finally get over the hump and stand alone at the top is a feeling second to none for Tracy and her team.

Oscar Schiff led the way for Hampshire, finishing sixth overall (16 minutes, 51.79 seconds) to start an impressive stretch of finishers. Owen Cubi (ninth, 16:58.68) was next, followed by Aidan Conklin (13th, 17:06.35), Nicolas Jones (22nd, 17:25.56) and Sam Plumer (25th, 17:34.34) as the Raiders recorded five runners in the top 25.

All of them set personal records on Sunday.

“It’s really great,” Schiff, a junior who’s been a member of the boys team for three years, said. “We’ve tried for this for a few years now and we’ve fallen short. But this year, the team was supposed to be really good. And we did it. We have a lot of young talent. We only have one senior. So we have a lot of people now with experience who can fill the space after that senior is gone.”

Mount Greylock (79 points), Frontier (80 points), Lenox (115 points) and Wahconah (178 points) rounded out the top five.

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Evan Hedlund finished in second with a time of 16:00.88 while Luke Howard (fourth, 16:13.67) joined his Redhawks teammate in the top five. PVCICS’ Grafton Tolopko (16:56.04) cruised to an eight-place finish while Belchertown’s Benjamin Les (17:03.47) finished 10th. Oliver Brown (21st, 17:23.19) of Frontier rounded out top 25 finishers in Hampshire County.

Belchertown (180 points) finished sixth and was led by Les, Miles McNamara (28th, 17:37.19) and Noah Les (36th 17:54.89). The Dragons (190 points) grabbed seventh place thanks to strong races from Tolopko and Owen Bauman (37th, 17:57.53), Hopkins (494 points) finished in 16th behind Jack Cycz (52nd, 18:28.02), Gateway (534 points) earned 18th with Jacob Maynard (87th, 20:03.77) cracking the top 100 and Easthampton (542 points) took 19th with William Jourdain (67th, 19:09.19) breaking the 20-minute mark.

On the girls side, Hampshire’s Kathleen Barry helped the Raiders continue their dominant day. Barry set a personal record by 20 seconds as she grabbed second place in the girls race – one spot ahead of last year’s third-place finish – in a time of 19:26.84 to lead Hampshire to a second-place team finish.

Charlotte Niswonger (13th, 20:41.94), Ada Corner (14th, 20:42.71), Alexandra Henrichon (17th, 21:11.72) and Corinne Somes (28th, 21:45.29) rounded out Hampshire’s scoring, but the Raiders were tied with Mount Greylock so it went to their sixth runner to decide the tiebreaker. Keegan Butler came in clutch with a 29th-place finish (21:58.70) to boost Hampshire into the runner-up slot.

“We had high hopes for Western Mass., and we all trained really hard for it,” Barry said. “We got on that line and we knew we wanted to run our best race for the team. And we did that.”

Lenox (68 points) won the Class B girls race. Frontier (132 points) finished fifth, PVCICS (162 points) took sixth, Easthampton (303 points) placed ninth, Gateway (351 points) was close behind in 10th and Belchertown (362 points) finished 12th out of 20 teams in the girls race.

Top 25 finishers outside of the aforementioned Hampshire participants included Frontier’s Sylvie DiBartolomeo (third, 19:45.54), Hopkins’ Caprial DiBartolomeo (16th, 21:07.33), PVCICS’ Sarah Fardal (23rd, 21:29.40), Frontier’s Liv Christensen (24th, 21:30.57) and Easthampton’s Gwen Banz (21:35.56). Gateway’s top runner was Anya Niles (39th, 22:48.98) and Belchertown’s was Kylie Fitzgerald (51st, 23:37.69).