CC impresses at Kollege Town

For the first of two consecutive home meets, the UW Oshkosh men’s and women’s cross country squads earned second-place and third-place tallies at the Kollege Town Sports Invitational on Saturday. This meet was held at the Lake Breeze Golf Club this weekend in Winneconne.

The men finished 11 points behind first-place Augustana College (Ill.), while the women earned 116 points and placed 30 points behind second-place North Central College.

Top-10 finishes propel men

The men’s squad was led by two freshmen runners placing in the top-10, Lucas Weber and Michael Juarez. Weber continued his strong season by earning a fourth place finish, while Juarez took home eight at a pace of 25:57, only 33 seconds behind the race winner.

Weber said the team has an exciting future to look forward to, but does not let it distract them from the season and its successes at hand.

“If somebody runs well, we focus on the positives, and if they don’t run well, we try and bring them up,” Weber said. “We are trying to move forward as a group, and we are really excited for the next couple of years. Nine of the top twelve [runners] are all freshman eligibility at least, so it should be a good couple of upcoming years.”

Of the placing runners, no participant finished outside the top-44 for the Titans, and of the seven highest-placing runners for Oshkosh, all finished 50th or better. Only the top-five athletes were counted for points in the race the 26-school race.

Next up for the men’s team were freshman Cody Chadwick, junior Brian McKnight and senior Dan Massey. The men rounded out the placing participants as Chadwick took home 16th, McKnight finished in 37th and Massey earned 44th.

Other finishers for the team were freshmen Noah O’Neill and Skyler Yunk, as O’Neill took home 46th place and Yunk rounded out the top-50 runners in the race. There were 362 runners in the field on Saturday.

Head coach Eamon McKenna said with the influx of youth on both squads this season, the experienced runners have helped solidify the team dynamic over the course of the year.

“I think both teams have done a nice job of welcoming and encouraging the younger runners this year,” McKenna said. “We have a lot of freshmen on both teams this year, and they are joining a competitive atmosphere that is pushing them to immediately be outside of their comfort zone and to pursue aggressive goals.”

Moore records another victory

Now on a three-meet winning streak, senior Cheyenne Moore ran to another victory and helped the women’s team earn third place in Winneconne. Moore took home first place by 25 seconds, running to the only sub-six minute pace of the race with a 5:57 and defeated 360 runners.

For Moore, the Roy Griak and Blugold Invitationals were the previous two meets in which she ran in, and she took home first place in both of these meets. Prior to this year, Moore’s only other first-place finish was in last year’s Wisconsin Intercollegiate Athletic Conference Championship meet, where the Titans earned a bid to the NCAA Division-III Championship race.

Supporting Moore’s top finish was freshman Hannah Lohrenz and sophomore Ashton Keene, who placed in 15th and 21st, respectively. This was Lohrenz’s second-highest finish and Keene’s third highest tally of the season so far.

The team has goals set outside of athletic performance for the season, and Keene said the academics and athletics coincide with each other and help drive the team to be successful.

“The goal this year is to build ourselves throughout the season towards being at our best for the last few big meets,” Keene said. “We want to rank high at Conference and compete for the opportunity to race at Nationals again. Additionally, our team would like to attain Academic All-American status, which requires a composite 3.1 GPA.”

Seniors Jessica Stamn and Cammy Garvelink rounded out the top-five runners for the women’s squad, as Stamn took home 46th place and Garvelink finished in 63rd place in the 6K race.

Rounding out the seven-highest runners for the Titans were freshman Reece Matheson and sophomore Amanda Van Den Plas. Matheson ran a 25:05 race to a tune of 66th place, and Van Den Plas was only 21 seconds behind in 82nd place.

Let’s try it again

The team hosts the UW Oshkosh Open at the Lake Breeze Golf Club this upcoming Friday, Oct. 20, as UW-Platteville, UW-Stevens Point and UW-Whitewater travel to Winneconne to run at the same location as the Kollege Town Invitational. This is the final regular-season meet before the WIAC Championship is held on Whitewater’s campus the following weekend.