NJSIAA Sectionals: Boys Recap
Photos taken by TSP Images for MileSplit.
NJSIAA Sectionals is the pinnacle of the XC season for many Mercer County teams, and tons of runners rose to the occasion and lifted their Thompson Park PRs to new heights. With spots at the group championships on the line — the top five teams in each group qualify, along with any individuals in the top 15 — it made for four hours of nonstop excitement!
Below are highlights for each Mercer County boys teams. Congrats to everyone moving on to Holmdel next week! Read the girls recap here.
Group 3 Boys
West Windsor-Plainsboro North finished in 2nd place with 58 points, which was probably a lot closer to Colts Neck (ranked #3 in the state) than most people would’ve expected! Luke Ferrer (5th in 16:43) and Agrim Jha (6th in 16:46) were excellent frontrunners as always, but a big reason for their success today was how well their 3-5 runners performed: Veejhay Roy (14th in 16:59) ran a Thompson Park PR by 35 seconds, Jordan Andrade (16th in 17:04) PR’d by 26 seconds, and Subomi Allison (17th in 17:12) PR’d by 50 seconds. Allison – the fastest 800m runner in Mercer County last spring – was particularly clutch today, moving up from being the Knights’ #7 runner last week. The Knights were also the top Mercer County team in the merged results, topping West Windsor-Plainsboro South 202 to 243.
Hopewell Valley got the job done and qualified for the group championships with a third place finish. They were led by Finnegan Curley (11th in 16:57), who bounced back from last week to PR and join the Thompson Park sub-17 club. They also got good insurance from #6 runner Mason O’Connor, who PR’d by 14 seconds, broke 18:00 for the first time, and finished only four places back from the Bulldogs’ fifth man.
Steinert is also moving on with an outstanding performance to get 4th in Group 3, just 14 points back from Hopewell Valley. Tyler Hurst was 4th in 16:36, taking 10 more seconds off his Thompson Park school record and once again being the second-fastest Mercer County runner on the day. His 16:36 is also the second-fastest time by a Mercer County junior in the last five years! Behind him were several other impressive runs: Nathanial Bigger (23rd in 17:33), Nihar Kolachalama (24th in 17:40), and Adam Szpakowski (32nd in 17:55) all ran 15-30 seconds faster than last week. Bigger actually joined Hurst in the Steinert record books, becoming #10 all-time at Thompson Park.
Ewing may have finished 11th, but they ended their season with a historic performance that shouldn’t be overlooked. Jayden Studivant (18:17), Shazad Singh (18:23), and Landyn Loesch (18:30) are now 3rd, 5th, and 7th on Ewing’s all-time Thompson Park list! Those three are just sophomores, and the rest of their top seven are all underclassmen, so don’t be surprised if they upgrade their 11th-place finish next year.
Nottingham was led by senior Mohamed Toure, who capped his impressive debut XC season by getting 20th in 17:26, his third straight PR at Thompson Park. Senior Ethan Wiebesiek also ran a nice 19-second Thompson Park PR in his last race for the Northstars. Matthew Alvarez also had his best race of the season and was only 9-seconds off his outright 5K PR. He’s just a sophomore, so he’ll be back!
Hamilton West edged Lawrence by just one point. Their top runner, junior Franklin Pineda-Ramirez, cut 12 more seconds off his Thompson Park PR and now sits just outside the Hornets’ all-time top-10 list. Senior Robert Mellick was particularly impressive and ran an outright 5K PR, 40 seconds faster than last week and 17 seconds faster than at Robbinsville two weeks ago.
Lawrence was led by junior Alden Smith, who had an absolutely massive race and ran an outright 5K PR of 18:58 despite the challenging course. That was over 45 seconds faster than last week. Wade Bullard and Jared Griggs likewise ran just as fast or faster this week than they did at the speedy Robbinsville course two weeks ago.
Group 2 Boys
Allentown was the unlucky 6th place finisher in Group 2, fifty points out of the final qualifying spot. There were some bright sides, though! John O’Leary (10th in 17:18) had an excellent race, running 14 seconds faster than last week to snag the last medal and qualify for groups as an individual. Sarth Shah (34th in 18:09) also ran 25 seconds faster than last week to finish as the Redbirds’ #2 today.
Robbinsville finished 10th in Group 2. Nish Sheshadri had an extraordinary race, breaking 18:00 for the first time ever to get 28th in 17:58. This was his first time being the Ravens’ top finisher. Tanay Samnani (33rd in 18:08) also ran his fastest Thompson Park time of the year.
Group 4 Boys
West Windsor-Plainsboro South ran great, finishing 3rd in Group 4 with 119 points, behind NJ #10 Manalapan (61 points) and NJ #17 South Brunswick (82 points). The Pirates’ team average was a stellar 16:58, fourteen seconds faster than last week. That was thanks in part to a huge race by senior Shravan Pradeep, who finished second in 15:51, just 8 seconds behind the #3-ranked runner in New Jersey! His time places him 7th on the Pirates’ all-time Thompson Park list. The Pirates also got excellent races from their #4 and #5 runners. Compared to last week, Joseph Maddalon dropped his time from 17:51 to 17:16, and Arjun Suresh improved from 17:52 to 17:39.
Princeton got 4th with another very solid performance. Finn Wedmid and Felix Farrugia, who have both run 17 flat at Thompson Park twice this year, finally crushed the 17:00 barrier with big PRs: Wedmid was 12th in 16:36 and Farrugia was 16th in 16:47. Evan Raphael stepped up as their #3 runner today, running a Thompson Park PR of 17:38 for 37th. The Tigers also got help from the return of Emilio Gonzalez Toro, who missed the CVC Championship meet but set a new 5K PR of 17:56 this week.
Hightstown finished 9th but was actually only 25 points off of qualifying for groups. Senior Burke Thompson continued the tear he’s been on since coming back from injury, getting 8th place in a huge PR of 16:23 and breaking the Rams’ Thompson Park school record by 1 second! Pretty much their whole top five – including Mason Johnson (34th in 17:31) and Dhruva Sribuddharju (43rd in 17:42, his first 5K under 18:00) – had their best races of the season, which made the gap to the other top teams surprisingly narrow.
Trenton ran a complete boys team at sectionals for the first time since 2019! Junior Briyon Ellerbe led the way with a new Thompson Park PR by 30 seconds. Four of Trenton’s five finishers are underclassmen, so hopefully we’ll see another official team result at next year’s sectionals!