Cross country teams turn in top 10 finishes in Wisconsin

Zach Anderson

Zach Anderson

The SDSU men’s cross country team earned a third-place finish out of 29 teams at the Jim Drews Invitational on Oct. 17 in West Salem, Wis. Michael Krsnak and Anthony Bongard paced the Jacks with personal bests, as they placed seventh and 15th respectively on a muddy course.

Krsnak finished the race in 24 minutes, 56.8 seconds and Bongard came in at 25:08.0.

“I don’t think the place is terribly significant; our goal was to beat La Crosse, but we weren’t able to overcome that,” SDSU coach Rod DeHaven said. “Michael and Anthony ran very strong performances as far as time goes and that is a good indicator of where they are at before the conference meet.”

La Crosse, at their home course, earned a second place finish over the Jackrabbits with 49 points compared to SDSU’s 92.

DeHaven said that the top nine runners for SDSU ran well, with nearly all of them running personal bests at the meet.

The Jackrabbit women’s cross country team placed sixth out of 27 teams at the Tori Neubauer Invitational in West Salem, Wis. Senior Ashley Storm led the way for the Jacks with a fourth place finish in a time 22 minutes, 1.7 seconds.

Teammate Nicole Davis came in 12th place in 22:16.5 and Kelsey Aune added a 27th place finish in 22:42.8.

“Unfortunately I thought (a low finish) was possible, after the first three runners we didn’t particularly have a good day,” DeHaven said. “Ashley and Nicole had outstanding races, they continue to get better and could potentially get top 10 finishes at the Summit League meet.”

The meet was the last tune-up before both the Jacks’ men and women teams head to the Summit League Championships on Oct. 31 in Cedar City, Utah.

#1.881339:1160095399.jpg:XC-8.jpg:Anthony Bongard (253) and Marshall Kambestad (255) compete in the SDSU Classic on Oct. 3. Bongard finished 14th and Kambestad 33rd at the Jim Drews Invitational in La Crosse, Wis.:Twyla Meyer