The cross country teams traveled to Boston last weekend to compete in the University Athletic Association Championships. While the men had a difficult time matching the competition, the women greatly improved their performance from last year.
The women, who finished seventh of eight teams last year, placed fifth of eight this year with 140 points – just 13 behind fourth-place University of Chicago. The winners of the meet were from Washington University in St. Louis with 31 points.
Senior Kellie Hasselwander led the team with a 12th-place finish in a field of 78. She clocked a time of 23:23 for the 6-kilometer course. This performance earned her Second Team All-UAA honors. The top seven finishers of the race were named to First Team All-UAA and finishers in eighth through 14th place earned Second Team All-UAA honors.
The support team behind Hasselwander included senior Laura Richenderfer, who finished 30th overall with a time of 24:28 and sophomore Allie McComb, who finished 35th overall at 24:39. Just behind her was sophomore Lisa Cole at 24:43, who placed 37th. Rounding out the scoring was sophomore Sadie Gollub, finishing 42nd and crossing the line at 25:03.
The first displacer for the ‘Jackets was junior Lauren Jewett, who placed 45th overall with a time of 25:25, and sophomore Rachel Given was the second displacer at 54th, finishing in 25:39.
The men were missing a key participant in the run this weekend. Senior Mark Stevens, who usually places amongst the top and won the meet last year, sat out on Saturday due to a quadriceps injury. He hopes to be able to run at the Regional Championship Meet in two weeks. The ‘Jackets placed seventh out of eight teams with a score of 153 points. The winner of the meet was New York University, who dominated the field with only 20 points.
Despite their dismal finish, the Yellowjackets still had two runners who earned UAA honors. Senior Dan Mueller placed 12th overall in the field of 78, crossing the finish line at 25:52 for the 8-kilometer course.
Just behind him was fellow senior Pat Hughes, who finished 13th with a time of 25:53. These two finishes earned them Second Team All-UAA accolades. The competition between ninth and 14th place was especially tight, with those six finishers coming in within six hundredths of a second of each other.
“A number of people ran pretty well,” head coach John Izzo said. “However, it wasn’t even. Some people had excellent races, but some people didn’t run well. This is a team sport, so everyone needs to have a good day.”
Behind Mueller and Hughes was senior Nick Roosa, who finished 35th at 26:29. Freshman Jon Pinto was next for the ‘Jackets, clocking in at 26:41. The final scoring member of the team was junior Tom Brekke, who crossed the line at 26:56 for 55th place.
The displacers for the team were junior Dan Chebot, who finished 60th with a time of 27:13, and freshman Daniel Lane, who finished 66th in 27:46.
This weekend, both teams travel to Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute for the New York State Collegiate Track Conference Championships. The men’s team will be running mostly freshmen and sophomores to give them more experience. The reasoning behind this is that the main goal is to finish at the top five at Regionals so that they can qualify for Nationals. The Atlantic Regional Championship meet is in two weeks at NYU.
Philbrick is a member of the class of 2009.
