By Christopher Hunt
(photo by Derek Alvez)
If track and field had buzz-beaters it would be like this. Fordham Prep simply needed to score to win. That meant a fifth-place finish.
Mount St. Michael ran out of the exchange zone on the first baton pass of the 4x200 relay and handed Fordham Prep its third straight CHSAA city championship and made it so all the Rams needed to do was finish the race. Then Fordham Prep’s anchor got tangled with Holy Trinity on with 150 left in the race but Holy Trinity’s anchor stumbled and the Rams came away unscathed to finish fourth in the last event and give Fordham Prep a two-point win, 38-36, over St. Anthony’s at the CHSAA championships Saturday.
“We had the best day we today we could have possibly had,” Fordham Prep coach George Febles said.
It didn’t seem like Fordham Prep had the heavy-hitters to secure a three-peat but took a 10-point lead into the final three events, the three relays.
St. Anthony’s Payton Hazzard used a riveting finishing kick to pass Kellenberg’s anchor on the home stretch to help the Friars win the 4x800 and close the lead to six. St. Anthony’s didn’t have a 4x200 relay, which meant the team needed to win the 4x400 to at least earn a tie.
After three legs, the Friars were in fifth with about a 40-meter gap on the lead pack and rookie senior Patrick Farmer taking the baton. Farmer instantly started to chop down the lead with everyone watching to see if he could erase an impossible gap. A lap later, Farmer was zooming down the backstretch like jet and completely one of the greatest relay legs ever seen at the Armory.
Farmer engulfed the leaders on the final turn and anchored the Friars will an incredulous 46.5 split that gave St. Anthony’s a win and tied the score at 36 with one event remaining. Asked if he thought he could catch up, Farmer flatly said no. That was until he saw the pack rapidly coming closer.
“I thought, damn is this really happening,” he said.
St. Anthony’s coach Tim Dearie called is the best anchor leg he’s ever seen in his 22 years as a varsity coach.
“Of course my kids were routing for St. Anthony’s to lose but when they saw Farmer coming around and running 46, all of them were smiling,” Febles said.
But Fordham Prep had already done too much to build a lead. Bruce Grant won the 55 dash in 6.56 then came back and won the 55 hurdles in 7.61, a hundredth of a second of former teammate Wayne Seaton’s meet record set last year.
“This is big,” Grant said. “We were in the shadow of last year’s team. This is huge to come out and win the way we did because I don’t think a lot of people expected it. We started believing it after the sectionals last week.”
The Rams earned big points by sweeping the shot put. Joe Paulus won tossing 50 feet, 9.25 inches. Mike Seminario finished second with a toss of 48-2 and Sal Annunziata third at a season-best 45-4.75.
“He’s getting back into the hang of it,” Seminario said of Annuziata, who struggled much of the season. “It’s a good way for all of us to end the season with a big win.”
Danny Zaccariello of St. Joseph’s by the Sea pulled off an impressive double. The senior won the 1,000, leading wire-to-wire in 2:29.32, the fourth-fastest time in the country this season and third-fastest in the state. He returned about three hours later in the 1,600 and the field played right into his hands with a slow early pace.
St. Anthony’s Patrick Murphy tried to break away with three laps left but Zaccariello responded to the move, hugged Murphy’s shoulder for two laps and then out-sprinted Murphy on the bell lap to win in 4:25.19. Murphy finished second in 4:25.96.
“My first goal was to come in and get a fast time in the 1,000,” said Zaccariello, who is considering Providence, Albany, Iona and Fordham. “I wanted to run 2:27 but that didn’t happen. I don’t know what happened (on the last lap). I just didn’t have it in my legs.”
St. Anthony’s Hazzard also won the 600 in 1:22.79. Farmer won the 300 in a meet record 34.28 despite a horrendous start.
“I didn’t know I was going so slow until I saw someone out the corner of my eye,” he said. “Then I just said, ‘Oh no, he will not pass me.’ I just wanted to win this race. I wasn’t thinking about time.”
Still it wasn’t enough.
“Fordham got point were they absolutely had to have them,” Dearie said. “It kind fell into place for them.”
Reach Christopher Hunt at chunt@armorytrack.com.