EOU Splits Dual with Whitman
WALLA WALLA, Wash. – The Eastern Oregon University Cross Country team competed in a dual meet Saturday afternoon against Whitman College in Walla Walla, Wash. Kody Shriver and Sasha Gonzalez were the top finishers for the EOU teams.
The men’s cross country team defeated Whitman, 22-33 in the dual meet. Leading the way for the Mountaineers was Shriver, who finished first in the race followed by Isaac Updike, who was three tenths of a second behind Shriver.
The goal on the Men's side was to run a controlled pack and push strong late and see how much ground we could put on Whitman over the second half of the race. For the first half of the race we had a deep pack of six with eventual winner(s) Kody Shriver and Isaac Updike running with teammates Kody Coxen, Alex Martinez, Josh Wise and Carlos Hernandez running in a tight pack with four or five Whitman guys. Early on there was a secondary pack of Nic Maszk, PJ Sebastiani, Calvin Edward and Dominic Clay.
"The race plan worked pretty well, with Shriver and Updike running very comfortably to go 1-2 and Alex Martinez turning in a very strong performance as our third man,” said head coach Ben Welch. “Considering we were without a number of strong runners (including Hans Roelle and Lucas Updike), I am pretty pleased overall with our performances. With this being our first meet and only second week of organized practice, we had a lot of positive things happen today.”
On the ladies side, EOU fell to Whitman, 23-36. Leading the way for EOU was Sasha Gonzalez who finished in a time of 24:40.92.
“We had hoped to run a bit closer to the Whitman women, but knew their depth would be our biggest challenge and that proved to be the case,” said coach Welsch. “As expected, the two Freshmen (Sasha Gonzales and Rachel Roelle) and one Senior (Cristal Delgado) lead things for the Mounties. The front three ladies really put themselves in the mix at the very front of the pack and competed quite well".
Our next two (Kailey Wilson and Christy Roe) started out to conservatively and had a tough time making up ground on a very deep Whitman squad. Vanessa Ruelas competed very well as our number six runner for her first ever Cross Country race.
EOU returns to action on Sept. 21 when they compete in the CCC Preview in Caldwell, Idaho.