Men 2nd, Women 4th at Prestigious Willamette Invitational 9/29/2018 4:46:48 PM SALEM, Ore. – The Eastern Oregon men’s and women’s cross country teams had great showings at the 44th Annual Charles Bowles Willamette Invitational on Saturday, as the men took second place while the women placed fourth in the Gold division of the meet. Racing against other NAIA programs and community colleges, both Mountaineer squads showed great improvement in the early season meet. The men’s team took second out of 19 schools with over 150 runners while the women were fourth out of 12 teams. Senior Lane Inwards led the men’s team for the second-straight meet, finishing fifth overall and third among scoring runners. Inwards finished the 8K course in 25 minutes, 22.4 seconds, an improvement of over a minute from his time at the EOU Invitational last week. Juniors Thomas Morrell III and Dustin Zimmerly finished back-to-back in seventh and eighth place overall as EOU had three of the top-10 runners. Morrell III crossed the finish line in 25:25.6 while Zimmerly was close behind at 25:29.3. Also picking up points for EOU was sophomore Hunter Kratz who, competing in his first meet as a Mountaineer, took 19th place in 25:53.6. Freshman Robie Swanson rounded out the scoring for EOU in 35th place in a time of 26:15.8. Freshman Braxton Wilson took 46th place (26:57.0) out of the large field of 160 runners. Sophomore Hunter Schiess placed 52nd (27:16.2), followed by freshman Travis Running in 55th (27:28.3), senior Brandon Hartill (27:36.6) in 58th and junior Craig Sanchez (28:42.3) in 93rd. In a 133-woman field, it was freshman Michelle Herbes that led the Mountaineers, placing 15th in a time of 18:48.6. Following the theme of improved times, Herbes dropped her previous race time by nearly a minute and a half. Fellow freshman Katie Jo Gebhardt also improved her 5K time by about 48 seconds, placing 23rd in 19:24.7. Senior Faith Homer completed her first race of the season, placing 28th in 19:38.5. Sophomore Megan Boals earned 26 points for the team after a 32nd place finish, crossing the finish line in 19:40.9. Senior Amanda Welch and freshman Molly Gulden went back-to-back in 42nd and 43rd place, finishing the race in 20:01.1 and 20:02.1, respectively. Freshman Calista Van Delden took 50th place (20:11.0) and freshman Dierdre McKay placed 53rd (20:26.9. Junior Brylee Moyle finished in 65th (20:51.6), freshman Kendra Blake took 66th (20:52.7), senior Alexa Jones placed 70th (21:01.2) and freshman Maliah Russell crossed the finish line in 22:49.7 for 104th place. The teams will take the next week off from competition before returning to the cross country course on Oct. 13 at the Lewis-Clark State Invitational in Lewiston, Idaho. For more information on Eastern Oregon cross country, follow @EOUAthletics or visit eousports.com. FOLLOW EOU ATHLETICS Facebook | Twitter | Instagram | YouTube Contact: Iain Dexter; 541-962-3946; idexter@eou.edu