SALEM, Ore. – The No. 4 Northwest Christian University women’s cross country team did not win their race, for the first time this season, but that did little to deter from another strongly excecuted team performance at the Charles Bowles Willamette Invitational, taking second place.
NCU scored 63 points as a team, finishing second and just 16 points behind the University of British Columbia, currently ranked No. 1 in the NAIA. The Beacons also boasted four of the top five runners from Cascade Collegiate Conference schools, futher cementing their status as the team to beat in the CCC championships next month.
Head Coach Heike McNeil said, “Their legs should have been pretty tired after this race. We didn't taper at all for this meet because we wanted a solid test of what we can still do on thrashed legs.”
Continuing to perform even above their own highly established standards, the Beacons have collected six top-25 NCU times over the past two performances including four on Saturday. Leading the way was sophomore Alyssa Harmon (pictured) who took seventh overall and second among collegiate runners with a personal record of 18:05. Her time is the tenth-fastest in NCU history.
Not far behind was Shea Vallaire in tenth place with her own personal record of 18:07. Allison Duvenez was 14th (18:18), followed by Sierra Brown in 15th (18:20), all earning spots in the NCU record book with solid times.
Michelle Fletcher rounded out the scoring for the Beacons in 36th place, coming in at 19:05. Rosa Schmidt was next in 57th (19:33) followed by Delaney McMahon (67th, 19:53) and Molly Gwinn (71st, pr 20:04).
Personal records were also set for sophomore Natalie Kogutkiewicz (20:15), sophomore Macie Gale (21:07) and freshman Lindsey Vermillion (22:17). Freshman Tiela Roland also ran, taking 145th place.
UBC scored 47 points to win the race behind the first-place collegiate finish of senior Maria Bernard with a dominant 17:18 time. Senior Amelie de Fenoyl was second amongst the collegians.
The rest of the standings followed along with the currently NAIA national rankings, nearly to a T. Behind UBC and the Beacons were no. 11 Lewis-Clark State in third and no. 21 Oregon Tech in fourth. In a mild upset, unranked Concordia finished ahead of no. 23 Texas Wesleyan in fifth place.
The race served as a defacto final tune-up for the Beacons before the CCC Championships on November 8. Only the Lewis & Clark Invitational remains on the regular-season schedule and coach McNeil stated that she plans to rest her top runners for the event. “There is a lot more we haven’t tapped into yet for these girls,” she said. “I am pretty excited about what we can do at the end of the season when we are rested, fresh, and fully prepared.”