The Sachem North boys cross country team turned in its best performance of the season Saturday at the Section XI Championships held at Sunken Meadow State Park. The boys finished an impressive second in Section XI, behind one of the best teams in the state Northport.
Sachem was led by senior’s Anthony Coccia and Isaac Garcia-Cassani. Coccia finished sixth overall and Garcia-Cassani finished ninth. Both of them punched their tickets to the NYSPHSAA Cross Country Championships held next Saturday at Queensbury High School.
In the process they also broke the elusive 17 minute barrier for the 5k at Sunken Meadow with times of 16:42 and 16:54 respectively. Not far behind them was the rest of Sachem’s scoring runners. Juniors John Onken, Dan Block and Mark Difulvio finished in 13, 17 and 37 place to pace the Arrows.
All five boys and Junior Daniel Stretz earned All-County this season based on their times and finishes at Division Championship meet and Section XI Championship meet.
The team hopes that their body of work this season and the runner-up finish in the county will help propel them to a berth in the New York State Federation Cross Country Championship in two weeks.