51-Game Losing Streak Broken; Fastest Mile in 30 Years
Ryan Fowkes ran the fastest mile that’s been run here in 30 years at the St. Anthony’s invitational track meet Saturday, and on Monday the baseball team snapped what its coach, Vinny Alversa, said was a 51-game losing streak at Amityville, a school whose program has also been struggling in the past few years.
East Hampton, with Kurt Matthews having come on in relief of Jackson Baris in the first inning — Baris having sustained a foot injury while batting — defeated Amityville 6-2. The Warriors were to have played here yesterday, but Alversa said that given A.P. testing today, he was trying to switch it to an away game, with Amityville to come here for the season finale this afternoon.
Matthews gave up three hits, walked none, and struck out 12 over the course of 6 2/3 innings. One of Amityville’s runs was unearned.
Matthews was quoted in Newsday as having said, “It feels so good to get a W. It’s a weight off all of our shoulders. But to our credit, we’ve never given up and always supported one another. Our coaches have been positive and continue to pick us up.”
As a result, East Hampton improved to 1-15 on the season, and Amityville fell to 0-16. Its losing streak stood at 60 games as of Monday.
“All the teams in our league, except us and Amityville, made the playoffs,” Alversa said.
Fowkes, a junior, who said after winning the Katy’s Courage 5K in Sag Harbor recently that he’d like to lower his 4:30 mile time by about 10 seconds, shaved almost four seconds off at St. A’s, running the distance in 4:26.16. Ben Turnbull, East Hampton’s coach, wondered if it were a school record, but apparently Artie Fisher, who ran a 4:24 in 1988, still holds it.
Fowkes, moreover, P.R.’d in the 800 at the Westhampton Beach invitational two weeks ago, placing second in 1:59.89, “the fifth-fastest time in the county,” according to Turnbull. His 1,600 time ranks him 11th countywide in that event at the moment.
Turnbull added that Matthew Maya’s 61.44 in the 400-meter intermediate hurdles at Westhampton and the 17.49 he did in the 100 high hurdles at St. Anthony’s were personal bests. In addition, Eamon Spencer ran a personal-best 2:04.30 in the 800 at St. Anthony’s, and, at the same meet, said Turnbull, the 4-by-400 relay team’s 3:36.13 was “the 15th fastest time in the county.” Maya, Spencer, Fowkes, and Robert Weiss made up that team.
East Hampton’s girls team also had good news this week, stemming from last Thursday’s 79-70 loss to Shoreham Wading-River.
Among Bonac’s winners were Ellie Borzilleri, in the 400 and long jump; Molly Mamay, in the 100 high hurdles; Ashley Peters, in the 100; Mikela Junemann, in the 400 intermediate hurdles, long jump, and, with Peters, Jen Ortiz, and Lillie Minskoff, in the 4-by-100 relay, and Helen Barranco, in the discus.
Among the runners-up were Ortiz, in the triple jump; Mimi Fowkes, in the 1,500-meter racewalk; Peters, in the 200; Mamay, in the 400 hurdles; Malena Inchauspe and Zoe Leach, in the high jump; Michelle Barranco, in the discus, and the 4-by-400 relay team of Ava Engstrom, Bella Tarbet, Lateshia Peters, and Borzilleri.
Yani Cuesta, the team’s coach, said that, moreover, the following posted season-bests: Anissa Santiago and Inchauspe, in the long jump; Leach, in the 100 hurdles; Penelope Greene, in the 1,500; Tiffany Lewis, Anna Carman, and Abigail McKenzie, in the 100 and 200; Joyce Arbia, in the 800; Katherine Pineda and Jenna Scalia, in the 200; Michelle Barranco and Elizabeth Camacho, in the shot-put, and Nicole Gutierrez, in the discus.
Cuesta added that Engstrom and Tarbet “had personal record performances in the 2,000-meter steeplechase at the St. Anthony’s invitational, Ava with a 7:57.07 and Bella with an 8:08.30.”
East Hampton is to hold its own invitational meet Saturday, beginning at 10 a.m.