Panetta Nabs All-State Honors as Calhoun Cross Country Closes Out Season

The Calhoun boys cross country team was up against a tall task in its final meet of the fall season, competing against the top teams in the state Saturday at the New York State Championship in Pawling. 

The Colts were led by seniors Tim Campbell and James Panetta, who finished the 3.1 mile race with All-State honors, and helped the team to a valiant eighth place finish.  Shaker High School took the overall Class AA title at the meet at Lakeside Park in the Hudson Valley. 

"Every time, I try to show the team that cross country is a very much a team sport, and these guys really knew how to be a team," Calhoun head coach David Hendler said. 

Despite not coming out on top in Pawling, Calhoun's second straight Nassau County championship was a tremendous achievement in itself, Hendler said. 

"We ran great, but the result does not take away from anything else they've done," he said.  "Our goal in the beginning of the year was to win the county championship and we did just that."

Panetta, who narrowly missed an individual title at the county championships at Bethpage State Park with a time of 15:57, drew a strong performance in the season finale with a time of 16:27, finishing in 14th place out of 108 runners.  

"This year, I feel like it was a more competitive race than last year moving up to Class AA," Panetta said. "As a team, I thought we had a really great season. We showed off in counties that we wanted to be the best and I think performed like we were."  

The top 20 finishers at Pawling received All-State accolades.

"I had two main personal goals, which were to go All-State and break 16 minutes at Bethpage," Panetta said.  "I achieved both of those so I am happy." 

Campbell followed up his fellow senior with a strong 29th place finish, running the tough Pawling course in 16:41.  

"I would've liked to go All-State, especially since I missed it by one place last year, but I really gave it my all up there," Campbell said. "We did great as a team, no complaints there."  

Six out of the seven runners who represented the Colts at the states are seniors, meaning a few of the younger runners will look to fill that leadership role to get Calhoun back to a third consecutive county title in 2011 and earn another trip to compete against the rest of New York State.  

"We have junior Nick Haile who will hopefully step up next fall. Then we have two sophomores in Zach Toner and Jack Curran for next year," Hendler said. "We hope that they will step into James and Tim's places, the same way they stepped into Bobby McGetrick and Kevin Harvey's places [Calhoun 2010 graduates]. They teach the younger kids what to do to be great, and that success is just passed on."  

Congratulations again to the Colts cross country team on a second consecutive county championship and a great performance at Pawling!  

Class AA State Championship Results

14. James Panetta- 16:27.5

29. Tim Campbell- 16:41.9

67. Brendan Abrams- 17:17.4

82. Kenny Woo- 17:41.5

88. Casey Bader- 17:45.3

91. Nick Macaluso- 17:53.6

96. Nick Haile- 18:04.8