The Northeast Invitational, held at the Reggie Lewis Center over the weekend, brought together track athletes from 160 schools to compete. It is certainly heralded as a premier event during the indoor season, and gives athletes an opportunity to see where they stack up against fellow competitors from neighboring states.
And despite the strong competition, runners from the Daily News area were still able to show their quality.
Most notably, the 600 was quite the kind event to area athletes. For the boys, Newburyport’s Jalen Wise ran a heck of a race, posting a personal-best time of 1:24.60 to place second out of 142 total competitors. Then in the girls 600, a pair of Newburyport athletes cracked the top-11. You had superstar junior Devin Stroope finishing fourth in a personal-best time of 1:39.37, while fellow All-Star classmate Morgan Felts set her new personal record and was 11th in 1:41.96.
But they weren’t the only Clippers who had strong days.
In the girls 55-hurdles, junior Lucy Buchmayr ran a blazing personal-best time of 8.98 in the prelims to make the finals, then posted a 9.10 to take sixth and reach the podium — out of the near-170 athletes who took part in the event. Finally for Newburyport, Blake Parker took 20th in the girls 1000, crossing in 3:13.47.
Triton also made the trip down to Boston to compete and had a handful of highlights.
On the boys side, Duncan MacDonald was 18th in the 1000 (2:43.73), Liam Kneeland was 25th in the shot put (41-0) and the 4×200 relay team of Sam Abt, William Hight, Michael Coco and Jayden Torres were 15th (1:37.76). For the girls, Ava Burl was 18th in the 1000 (3:11.46), while teammate Anna Romano was a few spots behind her in 21st (3:14.17).
PENTUCKET WRESTLING TRIO SHINE AT PELHAM INVITE
Three wrestlers on the Pentucket/Newburyport co-op team had great days at the Pelham Invitational over the weekend.
At 132 pounds, star junior Tanner Kamuda entered as the No. 1 seed and ended up placing second. He went 2-1 on the day, pinning Pelham’s own Drew Nicolosi in the quarterfinals (1:45) and Weare’s Hunter Griffin in the semis (5:25) before falling to Woonsocket’s (R.I.) Ethan Uttley in the finals.
Moving to 126 pounds, Newburyport native Martin DeJesus took third. He pinned his opponent in the quarterfinals (3:45), but dropped a bout to Isaiah Phillips out of Sanford, Maine in the semis. Not giving up, though, he bounced back with a pin of Tyngsboro’s Anthony Maraganis in the consolation bracket (3:27), then earned a 21-6 technical fall over Caleb Hauptman of Weare, N.H. in the consolation finals to finish up a 3-1 day.
Finally, Mason Skinner also finished third at 190 pounds. Entering as the No. 3 seed, he earned two pins during his opening two bouts in 1:24 and 1:18, respectively. He would fall to Pelham’s Russell Leonard in the semifinals in a tough 11-6 decision, but responded with two more pins to earn his bronze medal and wrap up a 4-1 day.
AMESBURY HOCKEY WINS IT IN OT!
At some point, Matt Venturi decided it was time to call game.
The senior was the hero for the Amesbury hockey team Saturday night, netting the game-winning goal in overtime to lead the Redhawks to a 3-2 win over Rockport. He also had a pair of assists, and teammate Bodie Marcotte was the forward behind the other two goals.
Freshman Colin Dyer had a solid game in net with 17 saves, and both Evan Murphy and Lincoln Kime had strong games defensively.
Amesbury now has a week off before hosting Beverly on Saturday at 5 p.m.
NEWBURYPORT HOCKEY HOLDS ON, BEATS LYNNFIELD
It wasn’t easy, but the Newburyport boys hockey team was able to hold on for a 3-1 win over Lynnfield on Saturday afternoon.
A tie game with just under five minutes left, the Clippers (6-2-1) took a 2-1 lead when a blast from Caden Eiserman from the point was tipped in by Colby Arel. For the last 4:44 of the game, however, the Clippers were forced to play shorthanded after a handful of consecutive penalties.
But they were able to close it out, getting a shorthanded tally from Tristan Joyce — his second of the game — and another strong performance in net from goalie Damien Lamb (28 saves).
COLBY SCORES TWICE, TRITON SHUTS OUT GLOUCESTER
The Triton hockey team only needed one goal to earn a win over Gloucester on Saturday, but Mason Colby decided to score two just to be safe. and thanks to the junior’s two-goal effort — as well as another stellar performance from junior goalie Gavin Marengi — the Vikings were able to come away with a 2-0 shutout victory.
Cullen Kohan, Jack Lindholm and Alex Pasquini had assists for Triton (6-4-0), which travels to play Billerica on Monday (3 p.m.).
Also, a pair of assists were mistakenly ommitted from the Vikings’ previous win against Rockport in Friday’s section. Both Cam Neary and Ryan Voltero had helpers, which helped to lead the Vikings to a 6-2 victory.