LEWISTON, Idaho – LC State Cross Country hosted its second invitational of the year coming off of a track meet last weekend in Caldwell. Windy conditions in the Orchards on Friday, with gusts registering around 40 miles per hour, meant the Warriors had another mentally tough meet. The women placed second with a score of 51, with Callie Johnson, Rylee Brown and Emily Adams in the top ten. Cole Olsen led the men to a second-place finish with a score of 40 and won the race. Clayton VanDyke and Chase Barrow followed Olsen and both earned spots in the top ten.
“The conditions weren’t great today, but fighting through that and trying to focus on racing sometimes will bring out some of the mental and psychological training that we need,” Head Coach Mike Collins said. “If you want to be good, you have to be tough, no matter what the races are like, and I think that helped us today.”
THE WOMEN
“On the women’s side, I am really pleased. I thought we packed up well, I encouraged my girls to take some risks today, and our big goal today was to finish in front of Carroll, who is ranked 10th in the country. Beating them today will be a good jump for us in the polls,” Collins said. “But we still have to take care of business with conference up next.”
Johnson lead the Warriors with a seventh-place finish and a time of 18:43. Brown followed in ninth with 18:51 and Adams rounded out the top 10, finishing with a time of 18:57. Freshman Abigail Gorton had a strong race and stepped up as the Warriors’ fourth runner, finishing in 14th (19:23). Maja Plaznik was 16th (19:36) and Brooklyn Shell followed in 17th (19:42).
Geraldin Correa finished in 18th (19:46) and Ciera Bailey and Abigail Peightal followed in 20th and 21
st with times of 20:17 and 20:28, respectively. Carli Jones finished in 24th at 21:07 and Kelsey Henry ran a 21:34, placing 25th.
“It was nice to see Callie better today and I think today’s performance from her was far more indicative of her talent and what she contributes to the team” Collins added. “I thought Rylee raced great today and Emily and Geraldin came through really well. The big spot for me today that pulled through was Abigail Gorton. She was a huge difference maker for us today and all these girls are very interchangeable. They work really well together, there are no egos out there and everybody is trying to compete as well as they can for the team and stay positive.”
College of Idaho won the meet and Carroll was third.
THE MEN
Olsen’s victory led the Warriors and earned a time of 25:10. VanDyke followed with a second-place finish and a time of 25:17. Barrow ran a 25:51 and finished in fifth while Dillion Dawson placed 15th (26:46). Four freshman followed Dawson, with Andrew Larson coming in 17th (26:53), David Phillis and Brady Nelson finishing in 27th and 28th with times of 27:48 and 27:50, respectively, and Carter Gordon placing 31st (28:43).
Colton Smith came in 34th (29:02) and Luke Sellmann followed in 36th (29:26). Josh Lay finished in 38th with a 29:51, Alejandro Martinez placed 41st (30:04), and James Magill ran a 31:37 to finish 43rd.
“On the guys side, we lost by a point and there are some good lessons there on how valuable every spot on the team is, whether you’re our first guy or our 10th guy” Collins said. “Everybody matters and we need to challenge ourselves to be better. Obviously not having Connor (Turpin) today hurt us, but we need to come back and be better if we want a conference title. But the guys raced, Cole had a good day, Clayton did a great job, and Chase especially was a big difference maker today. We have some work to do and plenty of time to do it so we will take advantage of that.”
College of Idaho won the race, Northwest was third, Multnomah was fifth and Walla Walla was sixth.
The Warriors will return to 5k and 8k action on March 26 when they host the Cascade Conference Championships up in the Lewiston Orchards. Both teams will be fighting for a top finish to help them advance to the NAIA National Championships in Cedar Rapids, Iowa on April 9.
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