Ridge Boys & Girls Advance to Group 4 Champs

The Ridge High School boys and girls cross country team traveled to Oak Ridge Park on Saturday to compete in the NJSIAA Group 4, North 2 Sectional Championship with the boys team finishing 2 nd and the girls team 3rd . As a result, both teams move on to compete in next week’s Group 4 State championship that brings together the top 5 teams from each of 4 sections across the state.

The boys scorers were senior Patrick Doran (8 th in 15:54), sophomore Brenden McMahon (11 th in 16:01), senior Connor McMahon (12 th in 16:01), junior Dmitry Cole (16 th in 16:08) and junior Matthew Fukushima (19 th in 16:15). Sophomore Kaleb Huang (33 rd in 17:17) and senior Jon Wey (34 th in 17:27) rounded out the team.

The girls were led by senior Annika Svensson, who finished 6 th with a time 19:34. She was followed in the scoring by freshman Rachel Biondo (18 th in 20:22), junior
Elayna Douglas (25 th in 20:49), junior Addison Daniel (36 th in 21:27) and junior Vienna LI (38 th in 21:33). Rounding out the team was sophomore Mehreen Kottaparambil (55 th in 22:09) and senior Alyssa Laird (71 st in 23:05).

Following the race Coach Nicole Gilhuley commented, “The girls ran well! Annika went out controlled and moved up throughout the race. Rachel and Elayna also stepped up big to help the girls secure 3 rd . Brenden, Connor and Dmitry packed up well for the boys.”

Both the boys and the girls will be at Holmdel on Saturday, November 5 th , for the NJSIAA Group 4 Championship. The boys race goes off at 1:30, followed by the girls at 2:30.