Runners hope to be ready for county meet

BY WAYNE WITKOWSKI
Staff Writer

A series of injuries have made things difficult for the Brick Township and Brick Memorial girls cross country teams, but they hope to be at full strength for the Ocean County championships at Ocean County Park next Friday, Oct. 24.

"We haven’t had a time where at least one of our top five runners wasn’t out," said Brick Township coach Don Blair. "We don’t have a depth and we’ve had a lot of nagging injuries. One girl would come back and then another would have to sit out."

Senior Christine Mancini is the latest one to be out, and Blair hopes her hamstring will be healed by next Friday. Senior Erin Redden, meanwhile, is starting to round back into shape from a hip injury. Brick Memorial coach Jessica Jones has a similar problem.

"Everything is coming along OK. We were hoping to have a few more girls, but we have two out with injuries," said Jones, referring to sophomore Dawn Marciani and freshman Davina Giordano, whom she hopes will be back by Oct. 24 and for the Shore Conference championships on Nov. 1 at Holmdel Park. "It’s been tough getting five people to run in a meet."

But both teams have had some bright spots thus far.

Kaity McCabe, a senior co-captain with Mancini, has run especially well for Brick Township, finishing second in the Shore Coaches Meet on the grueling Holmdel Park course in 20:23. She also was second in the Colts Neck Invitational early in the season and helped the Green Dragons finish first in the junior/senior division of the season-opening Roxbury Invitational.

McCabe also tied an Ocean County College course record in a victorious dual meet victory over Toms River South in 19:10.

The Green Dragons are 3-2 in dual meets with a victory over Toms River East in a dual meet and over Southern in a triangular meet that included a loss to Toms River North. There also was a close loss to Jackson in which sophomore Michelle Harder, one of the top runners, was out with shin splints. Blair felt the team could have won that meet if Harder was able to run.

But Blair also sees reason for heightened optimism for the county meet as his other runners show signs of improvement. He says freshman Tracy Ganjoin has "been terrific" while junior Jessica Hiller and sophomores Samantha Noonan and Marissa Griffith have lowered their times consistently. Freshmen Alexandra Sterling and Jessica Delaney round out the team.

Jackie Stier, one of Brick Memorial’s captains, along with senior Denise Sessa, has a personal best 23:07 against Manasquan in a meet that was tied, but decided on Manasquan’s better sixth-place finisher. Sophomores Jess Imbriaco and Jessica Alpert also have run well. The Mustangs also lost dual meets to the three Toms River public schools.