Rice, Lezcano team up twice on Friday

OZONE PARK, N.Y. – Trainer Linda Rice has dominated the proceedings so far at the Aqueduct winter meet with 26 winners through the first 22 cards. Through Monday, she has finished first or second with 43 of her 87 starters.

Jose Lezcano, who has dominated the rider standings with 38 victories, has been aboard 18 of Rice’s winners. The dynamic duo team up twice on Friday as Rice looks for potentially her eighth multiple-win day of the meet.

Rice has five runners entered in three of Friday’s eight races, starting with the uncoupled entry of I Love Jaxson and Crea’s Bklyn Law in race 4, a first-level allowance at a mile. I Love Jaxson is a New York-bred gelding by Flat Out who won a second-level statebred allowance on Dec. 21. That was his fourth win from his last five starts, a streak that began last Aug. 1 when I Love Jaxson won a $16,000 claiming race for Mike Miceli and was claimed by Rice.

I Love Jaxson’s one bad race came in this condition when he ran last behind Network Effect. That race was tougher than this one and the potential pace scenario could favor I Love Jaxson, who will be ridden by Dylan Davis

Crea’s Bklyn Law was second in this condition last out, though this looks like a tougher spot than that one.

Lezcano, who was aboard I Love Jaxson for his last win, has opted to stick with El Hermano, whom he has ridden to a pair of allowance wins for Bill Mott. El Hermano could be the primary speed in this field, though Singapore Trader did press the pace last out and drew the rail on Friday.

Lezcano and Rice team up in race 6, a starter allowance for 3-year-old fillies where Rice will send out the New York-bred Officer Hutchy. She won for statebred maiden $40,000 claiming on Nov. 21 then came back in the $500,000 Fifth Avenue division of the New York Stallion Stakes to be second behind A Freud of Mama, who came back to win Saturday’s $100,000 Franklin Square Stakes.

“She should be very strong in there,” Rice said. “I had her in an a-other-than, it was pretty tough. There’s no reason she shouldn’t be in a starter.”

Her competition includes Glass Ceiling, who drops out of a seventh-place finish in the Grade 2 Demoiselle for trainer Danny Gargan, and Wonder City, a shipper from the barn of Maryland-based Cal Lynch.

Lezcano and Rice team up again in the finale, a first-level allowance for older fillies and mares going six furlongs. My Roxy Girl has two wins from six starts since Rice claimed her in August. Rice was particularly impressed by her third-place finish in a Stallion Stakes in November.

“She ran a really sneaky good race. She had a bad trip in the stallion race,” Rice said.

My Roxy Girl is a stalker who could benefit from having stablemate Science Fiction in the field. Science Fiction makes her first start off the claim for Rice and Winning Move Stable and looks to be part of what could be a lively pace.