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Odell Bound For Roberts Wesleyan

KYLEE ODELL

Kylee Odell had hoped to have one more shot at a state track and field championship meet appearance this spring, and hopefully an elusive title at Cicero-North Syracuse High School.

The coronavirus had other ideas.

Now the Panama senior will have to make noise at the next level.

Odell recently signed a national letter of intent to run cross country as well as track and field at Roberts Wesleyan College.

“I visited back in November,” Odell said Tuesday, adding that she also considered Cedarville (Ohio) University. “It’s close to home and the cross country team has gone to nationals in the past.”

The National Christian College Athletic Association school in Rochester is getting a good one.

The five-time state cross country qualifier was named to the Class D All-State First Team in both 2018 and 2019. As an eighth-grader in 2015, Odell took 62nd at Monroe Woodbury High School. She improved upon that in 2016 as a freshman, finishing 29th at Chenango Valley State Park. A 10th-place finish at Wayne High School as a sophomore in 2017 earned her a Second-Team All-State nod before she took seventh at Sunken Meadow State Park in 2018 and fifth at SUNY Plattsburgh this past fall.

“Like most kids, she’s had a couple of spots where it has dipped a little bit, but compared to a lot of other female athletes she had worked through that,” Clymer/Sherman/Panama head coach Ray Shrout said Monday. “She takes a lot of pride in being a front runner. … She’s active all year-round. Others maybe do one or two seasons, but she stays active and works hard to maintain her times and improve her times.”

As a sophomore, Odell was the Small School Unseeded race champion at the McQuaid Invitational and the Class D sectional champion.

“A lot of people don’t realize how competitive our section and county is,” Shrout said. “At the state meet we had four or five girls from our county medal in the top-20. … It seems like every school has at least one good athlete. When you go into a race, there’ll be somebody there that will give you some sort of push.”

As a junior, Odell repeated at the McQuaid Invitational while also taking first at the East Aurora Invite, Southern Tier Invite and Section VI championships.

“If she goes into a race knowing she’s the defending champion,” Shrout said, “it’s a big deal for her to defend that title and not let herself down.”

Her accomplishments in track and field are nearly as impressive.

Odell holds five individual records and shares a relay record at Clymer/Sherman/Panama.

In the 800 meters, her best time is 2:18.20 while her top 1,500-meter time of 4:45.32 earned her an eighth-place finish at the 2018 state championships.

She’s the Wolfpack’s 3,000-meter run record holder with a time of 10:56.87; the 2,000-meter steeplechase record holder with a time of 7:46.04; and even the C/S/P long jump standard bearer with a leap of 15 feet, 5 inches.

Odell’s 3,200-meter relay that included Anneke White, Natalie Carris and MacKenzie Gratto set a program record with a time of 9:59.49, winning the 2018 Super 8 Relay and the 2019 Chautauqua-County Athletic Association meet championship.

Her other accomplishments include winning the 2018 and 2019 Jason DeJoy Memorial Mile at the Joe Paterniti Memorial Track & Field Classic and being named the Sportsmanship Award winner for Section VI at the 2019 state cross country meet.

“Cross country ended well, but I just wish I had another chance to go back to states for track one more time,” Odell said. “I also miss just being with my teammates for one last season.”

At Roberts Wesleyan, she’ll join a pair of familiar faces to Southern Tier running fans on the cross country team where twin sisters Abby and Bailey Gostomski of Cattaraugus-Little Valley will be juniors in the fall.

“She made the visit and really liked the atmosphere up there,” Shrout said. “She roomed with (the Gostomskis) and having a local connection up there kind of helped.”

The Redhawks are coached by Andrew Dorr, the director of cross country and track & field.

The teams compete in NCAA Division II. Dorr was named the East Region Head Coach of the Year this past season by the U.S. Track & Field and Cross Country Coaches Association after men’s team won an East Region championship title, and the women’s team finished second. Both teams also won their sixth straight East Coast Conference championships last fall — all of which came under Dorr’s reign.

Odell will be no stranger to that type of success, coming from successful C/S/P cross country and track & field programs, as well as the Panama basketball team in the winter.

“The message I tell the kids is no matter how good of a runner you are, there’s always a college team or some place you can fit in if you want to run at the college level,” Shrout said. “With Kylee, we knew early on it was something potentially for her to achieve and go after.”

Shrout also isn’t surprised that younger girls in the Clymer/Sherman/Panama program, like Kylee’s eighth-grade sister Haley and teammate Hannah Schauman, are beginning to see success as well.

“It’s happened more than once that younger girls have written that they want to be as good as Kylee,” Shrout said. “When you have a kid that’s worked that hard, demonstrates work ethic and is naturally a good person, younger girls want to fill those shoes, so to speak.”

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