Tuesday, November 10, 2026
While most high schoolers are thinking about their costumes for Halloween, that didn’t apply to the athletes on Nassau County high school cross-country teams.
After both the East Meadow boys and the girls’ teams went 12-1 in the regular season, including a perfect 6-0 record against division opponents to win the division title, both squads took home second place at the Class I championships at Bethpage State Park. Arguably, more valuable than a costume party.
“We did pretty well,” Jets coach Michael Ringhauser said. “Both teams accomplished the exact same things this season, both 6-0 in the division, both 12-1 in the regular season, both division champs and county runner-up.”
This is not his first rodeo: it’s the girls’ sixth consecutive division title. Been there, done that.
“The girls, they established a tradition, and they’ve worked together,” Ringhauser explained. “They’re very unselfish, they want the best for each other, so they really run as a team, and a lot of the time put aside their individual pursuits on the backburner in order to achieve the greater successes of the team.”
And they did. Sophomore Ashley Zheng crossed the 5K finish line at 20:19.30 in 12th overall, just ahead of freshman Gianna Molinaro’s 20:20.90 finish. Exactly 20 second later was Isabella Estrella at 20:40.90. All of these runners, Ringhauser said, have had strong, enduring and impressive seasons, with their own stories to share about how what it took for them to cross the finish line.
Zheng, who he labeled as one of the most impressive and seasoned runners of the season, said that she likely takes inspiration from her older sister, a recent East Meadow alum who was also an All-American race walker.
“Zheng is someone who has come a very long way in her training,” Ringhauser said. “Ashley was able to go to some of those higher end meets to watch her sister last year and I think that inspired her [to go] ‘woah if she can do it, maybe I can do it also.’”
Molinaro, Ringhauser said, is someone who the coaching staff can tell has fallen in love with the sport and is generally off to a great start in her high school career.
For the boys’ team, it’s a different story: this is their first division title in eight years. Ringhauser even joked that Port Washington has reliably given them grief the past few seasons, so he is especially proud to see his athletes reap the rewards.
“This year they put in a tremendous summer of training, they really bought into all of the little things they had to do, and they translated into a great team success,” he said.
This year, the county championships did the talking for the boys.
East Meadow’s Caleb Noyola nabbed second at 16:19.50. Noyola also ran the second-fastest time at Bethpage in school history, Ringhauser flaunted. “A lot of good years ahead for him,” he added.
Finishing shortly behind him at 17:00.10 was Matias Olier. After him, East Meadow came in quick succession: Mikail Mirza at 17:14.30, Timur Yucel at 17:15.30 and Kyle Chung at 17:16.90. Coincidentally, those four runners, Ringhauser labeled them as “The Pack.” Reliably good and typically around the same time, Ringhauser said The Pack perfectly exemplified what he wants his players to be: all working together and pushing each other.
“Those four runners are interchangeable,” the coach said. “What I’ve tried to instill in them is ‘every week, one of you is going to feel good, so if that person takes the lead and everyone else just follows and we run as a pack, good things are going to happen,’ and that’s sort of what happened this season. If we all finish as a pack, that’s good for the team, and we’re also sticking together, that’s good for us individually.”
The best part, for Ringhauser, is that he knows that most of East Meadow’s top performers will be back next fall. As nice as it is to soak in present day success, he’s already thinking about what’s in store for upcoming seasons.
“It should be, hopefully a prolonged period of success,” he said.
