XC places 8th at Notre Dame, outruns 5 top-ranked schools

By Natalie Clericuzio     10/9/08 7:00pm

Friday evening, the night before the Notre Dame University football team defeated Stanford University in front of tens of thousands of fans, the Rice women's cross-country team ran in the Notre Dame Invitational in front of a slightly smaller crowd. Last season the Owls won the Notre Dame Invitational, but this season they stumbled, finishing eighth. This weekend Rice will run a smaller squad at the Houston Baptist University Invitational. In order to give some of the less experienced runners more practice, head coach Jim Bevan decided that he will send a portion of his team to the Saturday race. Other teams at the meet should include HBU, Texas Southern University, Pan-American University, Prairie View A&M University and a few more to-be-determined schools.

Even though Rice finished eighth at the Notre Dame Invitational, the placement does not reflect how well the team actually competed or the strength of the other schools competing in the meet. Bevan believed the schools competing this year were much more competitive than last season. Last year there were nine ranked teams coming in competing at Notre Dame, but this year there were 12, Bevan said. He also believed it was the best meet in the country last week.

Two early mishaps set the Owls back. Senior Claire Shorall fell near the start of the race after losing her shoe. According to Bevan, she hurried too much when she tried to catch up, skewing her pacing for the race.

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Additionally, freshman Michaela Reynolds, competing in her first meet as an Owl after dealing with knee problems early in the season, was also thrown off course early in the race. After being pushed in the back near the start of the race, she ran the rest of the meet with a tight muscle.

Despite these two problems, Rice still beat several ranked schools, including the University of Illinois, the University of New Mexico, Texas Tech University, the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill and Boston College. By beating ranked schools, Rice may earn points toward qualifying for nationals in November.

The Owls finished second overall out of Conference USA schools, only six points behind Southern Methodist University. Bevan was happy to see the Owls do so well.

"[Of] our first four runners, all four ran much faster than last year on the same course," Bevan said. "I was delighted by their efforts . Sometimes finishing eighth doesn't look that good. But when you're finishing eighth and there's four ranked teams that you beat, it was an outstanding weekend."

After this meet, both Rice and SMU are nationally ranked at 24th and 21st respectively. This week is the first time since Rice joined C-USA that two women's cross-country teams have earned a national ranking.

Senior Lennie Waite led all Rice runners, finishing 10th overall with a time of 16:59. Her time was the same that All-American Marissa Daniels (Jones '08) ran last season. Her tenth place finish also placed her ahead of two All-Americans: Alyson Kohlmeier of the University of Michigan and Christina Munoz of Texas A&M University. Bevan continues to be impressed by Waite's running this season.

"It's just unbelievable how far she's come since she started with us two and a half years ago," Bevan said. "She's come an awful long way and she performs at an extremely level at a high level of competition. It was a tremendous performance by her."

Junior Nicole Mericle and sophomore Allison Pye also finished in the top fifty at Notre Dame. Mericle placed 18th with a time of 17:05, and Pye came in 32nd at 17:16. Bevan was impressed by their times, as well.

"That was the best cross-country race Nicole Mericle has had, and Allison Pye improved from last year," Bevan said. "I can't say enough good things about how the whole team performed under pressure."

Junior Britany Williams also ran a strong race for the Owls, finishing 66th with a time of 17:41. Freshman Keltie John rounded out the Rice top five, coming in 132nd at 18:21.

"Keltie ran the best meet of her life," Bevan said. "She improved 35 seconds from A&M, and that's the fastest 5K she's ever run. She did a real good job over the last thousand meters picking some people off and that allowed us to beat New Mexico and Illinois for eighth place."

Sophomore Becky Wade, who has been unable to compete this year, is improving, Bevan said.

"She's coming along," Bevan said. "She is running, and we are taking it a few days at a time to see if she's going to make it back for this season or not. She is doing better every few days."

After this meet, the team will begin preparations for the Pre-Nationals meet on Oct. 18. That meet, held at the same place as nationals in Terre Haute, Ind., had 93 schools registered and roughly 24 out of 30 nationally-ranked schools participating as of Oct. 2. Most importantly, the upcoming long weekend will give the Owls time to regroup.

"It's a critical time of the year," Bevan said. "The midterm break on Monday and Tuesday will come at the right time for us, but I've been real happy with what's happened in the last few weeks.

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