Yani Cuesta, who coaches East Hampton High’s girls track team, and Sean Knight, who coaches the boys, were pleased with their charges’ performances in the 10-team East End Classic invitational meet contested by 381 athletes here Saturday.
“Over all, it was a great day,” said Cuesta, whose girls had given undefeated East Islip a scare here last Thursday before bowing 81-69 as the result of two relay losses. “We had a lot of personal records and walked away with a lot of hardware.”
Besides East Hampton’s boys and girls, the Classic drew entries from Westbury, Patchogue-Medford, William Floyd, Shoreham-Wading River, Mattituck, Southold, and Hampton Bays High Schools, and from the Ross School, whose coach, Louisa Garry, took 15 of the 26 she coached at the private school this spring.
“We hope to keep growing and improving our invitational each year,” Cuesta said.
Among East Hampton’s open division winners Saturday were: Dylan Cashin in the 1,500-meter racewalk; Ryleigh O’Donnell in the 800; Greylynn Guyer in the 1,500; Sara O’Brien in the 400 intermediate hurdles; the 4-by-800 relay team of Guyer, O’Brien, Laura Martinez, and O’Donnell, and Becca Trowbridge in the discus.
Open division runners-up were Sierra Stumpf in the pentathlon; the 4-by-100 relay team of Fio Duran, Lucia Mogavero, Sam Ruano, and Leah McCarron; the 4-by-400 relay team of Shirley Jiang, Siena Link-Morse, Maggie Greenwald, and Josie Mott; Alex Kolhoff in the long jump and high jump, and Ali Munoz in the pole vault.
In the freshman-sophomore division, Sophia Figueroa won the 100-meter high hurdles, and Kaili Moore won the shot-put.
East Hampton’s boys team fared particularly well in Saturday’s freshman-sophomore competition. Liam Knight won the 200 and 400; Max Bellenoue won the 1,600; Nelvin Suchite won the 100; Hudson Goulart won the high jump; Eduardo Calle won the long jump; Miles Menu was second in the 110 high hurdles, and third in the 400 intermediate hurdles; Marcus Oransky was third and second in those races; Jasper Samuelson was second in the 800 and third in the 1,600, and Sebastian Beech was second in the 400.
In open division events, Brayan Rivera won the 1,600 and was second in the 800; Edmar Gonzalez-Nateras won the 800 and was second in the 1,600; and Isaac Rodriguez won the pole vault. The 4-by-100 relay team of Knight, Gonzalez-Nateras, Beech, and Rivera was a runner-up, as was the 4-by-800 team of Benson Edman, Bellenoue, Matt Mattina, and Samuelson.
Afterward, Cuesta said she was particularly pleased with the pentathlon performance of Stumpf. “Usually, our pentathletes are seniors — it’s really exciting that Sierra is only an eighth grader. It was her first time doing the events. She beat the Patchogue-Medford girl, Mikayla Cooper, in the 100 high hurdles, tied her in the high jump, and lost to her in the long jump, the shot-put, and 800. It was an incredible performance from such a young, inexperienced athlete. . . . She hadn’t ever thrown the shot until this meet. I can’t wait to see how she does in the county meet.”
Cuesta added that O’Brien’s winning 400 hurdles time of 67.69 seconds almost broke the 67.24 that Crystal Winter ran in 2000, and that Cashin’s recent 7:20.00 in the racewalk was just six seconds shy of Nina Piacentine’s school record, set in 2016.
As for the East Islip meet, “We were tied going into the relays. They won the 4-by-1, we won the 4-by-4, and they stacked the 4-by-8,” Cuesta said. “Coach DeLuca and I were extremely proud. East Islip was the county’s small schools champion in the winter.”
In that meet, winners were Figueroa in the 100 high hurdles, Cashin in the racewalk and 3,000, O’Donnell in the 800, Moore in the shot-put, Trowbridge in the discus, and the 4-by-400 relay team of Jiang, Greenwald, Bennett Greene, and Mott.
Tennis and Lacrosse
In other sports news, Ross School and East Hampton High School competitors in the Division IV boys tennis tournament — a group that was headed by Ross’s number-one, Eduardo Menezes, the tourney’s top seed — were vying for titles earlier this week.
Jack Graves Photo
Menezes, a native of Brazil, who has a very strong all-around game, was an odds-on favorite to win inasmuch as he recently bageled the division tournament’s second seed, Ray Hidaka, of Shoreham-Wading River in a team match that assured the Ravens of an undefeated season. Ross won that match, played at Shoreham on May 7, by a score of 6-1. The loss came at second singles as Kai Hidaka edged Jagger Cohen 3-6, 6-3, 10-3. Menezes, as aforesaid, defeated Ray Hidaka 6-0, 6-0, and Teddy Brodlieb, at third singles, defeated Travis Finnegan 2-6, 6-3, 10-8.
Ross swept the doubles, with Henry Tietz and Leonardo Carmo, Nicolas Sanchez and Simon Ager, Alex Frohlich and Daniel Senado, and Rowan O’Brien and Harry Hackett all winning in straight sets.
Quarterfinal, semifinal, and final rounds in the division tourney were to have been played Monday and Tuesday at William Floyd High School. Quarterfinal singles matchups paired Menezes with East Hampton’s Miguel Garcia, Kai Hidaka with East Hampton’s Nick Cooper, and Cohen with Nick’s brother, Henry. East Hampton’s Mitchell brothers, Cameron and Kiefer, and Tietz and Carmo of Ross, the doubles bracket’s second-seeded team, went into Monday’s quarterfinals having won first and second-round matches with ease.
In other postseason news, the 10th-seeded South Fork boys lacrosse team on which a number of East Hamptoners play, lost 15-8 at seventh-seeded Bay Shore Saturday — a game in which Charlie Corwin had three goals and two assists. South Fork made the playoffs thanks to a 15-14 win at Commack on May 8, Luca Lattanzio’s goal in the final minute and a half putting the Islanders over the top.
