Sophomore Jack Tindall won his 2nd straight title, and the Cherokee boys won their 7th straight South Jersey Group 4 championship and 15th overall Saturday in Logan Township.
Tindall made it four straight Cherokee individual winners and 11 in the last 21 years, running 15:29.73 over 5,000 meters at DREAM Park and winning by 80 meters over senior Alvin Lin of Cherry Hill East, who was 2nd in 15:44.96.
Cherokee topped Cherry Hill East 42-59 with those two programs taking six of the top eight spots in the race.
Cherokee junior Benjamin Realley placed 3rd in 15:48.14, junior Sean Sooy was 6th in 16:02.25, junior Maximo Harada ran 14th in 16:14.94 and junior Leo Vyvyan was 18th in 16:27.20. They were backed up by 6th runner junior Gavin Danielewicz in 19th in 16:33.38. Seventh runner senior Dominic Pileri also ran sub-17, taking 31st in 16:55.71.
Cherry Hill East junior Cian Sherlock ran 15:52.57 and placed 4th, and senior Milo Poerner made it three in the top 10 in 8th in 16:02.95. Junior Aneesh Rajagopal and freshman Conan Poerner were East’s 4th and 5th runners, Rajagopal 20th in 16:34.37 and Poerner 25th in 16:47.74. Freshman Braedan Sherlock [28th in 16:50.21] and senior Adam Billet [33rd in 17:04.97] also raced for Cherry Hill East.
Cherokee also won South Jersey Group 4 in 1988, 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2007, 2011, 2016, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023 and 2024.
Tindall is Cherokee’s third repeat winner. Alex Yersak won three South Jersey Group 4 titles in a row from 2005 through 2007 and Nick Kuenkel won in 2022 and 2023.
Other Cherokee winners: Marc Pelerin in 2001, Shawn Wilson in 2012, Jack Shea in 2016, Justin Kelley in 2017 and Ethan Wechsler in 2018.
Cherokee swept the individual and team titles the last four years as well as 2007 and 2016.
The top 15 individuals and top five teams advance to the state Group 4 meet, scheduled for Saturday at Holmdel County Park.
Also in the top 15 are Williamstown Dominic Burgio [5th in ], Eastern Timothy Shack [7th in ], Egg Harbor Matthew Reed [11th in ], Washington Township Trevor Szilier [12th in 16:12.25], Williamstown Logan Pavelik [13th in 16:13.38] and Kingsway Michael Beaver [15th in 16:17.05].
Joining Cherokee and Cherry Hill East are team qualifiers are Egg Harbor [116], Southern Regional [127] and Kingsway [178].
From the Backstretch by Reuben Frank 