Women finish 8th, men 9th in cross country’s final meet of the season
Sophomore Lauren Fog led the women’s cross country team for the first time in her career as the Braves took home an eighth-place finish at last week’s Missouri Valley Conference Championships.
Fog’s time of 19 minutes and 11 seconds was the best 5K time of her career and it was good enough to earn her 32nd place overall. Junior Amanda Switzer followed closely behind Fog, taking 35th with her time of 19:25.96.
Bradley had two more runners place in the top 50, with sophomore Mary Goldkamp taking 46th and sophomore Leann Murphy taking 50th. Both runners also stayed under the 20-minute mark, with Goldkamp coming in at 19:42 and Murphy at 19:50.
The final counter for the Braves was junior Rachel Brubaker, whose time of 20:24 earned her 57th place. Junior Tracy Lotter finished out the scoring for Bradley, taking home 70th place with a time of 21:21.
Wichita State took first place in team scoring with 59 points, which included a second-place finish from Kellyn Johnson and a third-place finish from Irene Kosgei. Pasca Cheruiyot was the overall winner of the women’s race, helping lead Missouri State to a second-place finish.
The men’s team finished in ninth place in its 8K race behind sophomore Brian Tyne’s 44th-place finish. Tyne finished the course in 26:59 to lead the Braves.
“On the men’s side, the guys we ran, ran hard, but it’s tough to expect a good finish after redshirting our two best runners and having to deal with Andrew Wieser’s injury,” coach Dave Beachum said.
Next in line for Bradley was sophomore Tim Owdom who finished back-to-back with teammate Chris Frank for 55th and 56th places, respectively.
Owdom clocked-in at 27:45, while Frank followed behind at 27:48.
Freshmen Eric Garcia and Joe Wegner made up another set of back-to-back finishers for Bradley, with Garcia locked up 62nd place at 28:57 and Wegner taking 63rd at 29:04.
Southern Illinois racked up 37 points to edge out Indiana State for the team victory.
The Braves will compete next in the NCAA Midwestern Regional on Nov. 15 in Stillwater, Okla.
“In order to make it out of that race, you have to finish in the top two, which none of the schools in our conference are capable of,” Beachum said.
