Sacred Heart's Maeve Going captures her fourth straight NSCHSAA girls cross country title

When Sacred Heart senior Maeve Going crossed the finish line, the entire outlook of the Nassau-Suffolk CHSAA’s history changed.

Going won her fourth girls consecutive cross country NSCHSAA individual championship at Sunken Meadow State Park on Sunday afternoon, becoming only the second female runner in league history to ever win that title in all four years of high school. Maggie Maier, who also ran for Sacred Heart, won the individual league championship every year from 2016 to 2019.

Going was already having a great high school career by the NSCHSAA’s standards, as through her junior year, she had been one of only six runners since 1981 to have won the individual league title three times. However, by joining Maier’s company as the league’s only runners to have won it four years, Going is officially in the conversation for potentially the greatest in league history.

“When I won in my sophomore year, and even in my junior year, people would talk about me potentially winning all four years, but I would hate when people said stuff about that because you never know,” Going said. “It’s a relief for it to finally be done. I’m so happy to have represented my team and win this race. This one is definitely a relief compared to the other ones.”

She won this 2.5-mile championship race in 14 minutes, 44.2 seconds. Going had to wait past the finish line for another minute and 16.3 seconds just to see the second-place runner finish, which was her teammate, junior Elle Riches.

Going, who will be running at the University of Pennsylvania in college, pulled off this fourth straight title in dominant fashion despite a nagging cyst in her left knee, she said, which causes it to swell and requires ice after running.

“It’s nice that things like this can happen for me, because just to know that I can do this gives me confidence,” Going said. “I know now that I can make other things like this happen in the future.”

Despite her and Riches’ top-two finishes, Saint Anthony’s depth carried it to its seventh consecutive NSCHSAA team title. Junior Elena Ciaccio placed third in 16:15.5 as the Friars' top finisher. Junior Catherine Savage took fourth, sophomores Meghan Murtha and Sarah Ullrich finished fifth and sixth, respectively, and senior Kiera Cameron grabbed eighth place to secure the win.

St. Anthony’s placed its top five before anyone else could place their third runner, scoring 26 points for the win. Ciaccio, who has been the team’s top runner for each of the last three years, was glad to keep the team title streak going.

“I was getting nervous after [Going and Riches] came in first and second,” Ciaccio said. “I’m so proud of everyone. They all finished so strong together. I did not expect that. It was such a relief. We’ve been working so hard, and we push each other every day. I’m just so glad that we were able to pull this one off.”

By Mike Anderson

michael.anderson@newsday.com

Mike Anderson is a high school sports reporter who has covered 12 sports so far at Newsday. He was the sports editor of Stony Brook University's campus newspaper for two years.