Senior Captain Scott Mueller, Marquette's top male finisher, took 24 overall finishing the 8K in 24:31.,”The Golden Eagles' men's and women's cross country team returned from Louisville, Ky. this past weekend after having each taken seventh place at this year's Big East Championships.
Senior Scott Mueller, Marquette's top male finisher, took 24th overall finishing the 8K in 24:31.55. Next came junior Kyle Saginus in 24:44.85 taking 31st, then freshmen Nick Szczech in 35th with a time of 24:47.75, freshman Brice Cleland in 39th with a time of 24:56.35 and senior Cody Miles who came in 61st with a time of 25:49.80.
"Overall I was very happy with the way both teams performed," said head coach Mike Nelson. "On the men's side without a doubt that was our best team performance all year long. On the women's side it probably tied our best team performance from (the Bill Dellinger Invite in Eugene, Ore.)."
Sophomore Jayne Grebinski led the women's team, finishing the 6K in 21:23.35. Grebinski took 19th place overall out of 132 runners. Senior captian Cassie Peller finished 21st in 21:25.60. The women's top-five was rounded out by sophomore Anna Weber taking 27th with a time of 21:36.50, senior Kaitlyn Chambers in 46th with a time of 22:03.35 and sophomore Amanda Beggs, who took 53rd finishing in 22:20.45.
Both Peller and Nelson mentioned how stiff the competition on the women's side has become.
"My sophomore year we got third (at the Big East Championships)," said Peller. "This year it felt like we really turned it up a notch, but still got seventh."
Nelson said he felt the women ran a better race than they did last year at the Big East Championships despite finishing fifth last year. He also said both teams performed much better than they had at Pre-Nationals two weeks prior.
"One of the things that hurt us at Pre-Nationals was that our fifth person on each side was pretty far back," said Nelson. "We did a much better job of getting that fifth person up closer to the third and fourth."
A few runners who had notable performances were Weber for the women and Miles for the men. Weber knocked 16 seconds off of her time from Pre-Nationals, while both Peller and Grebinski did slightly worse. Miles, who is that fifth runner Nelson spoke of, had a personal best time of 25:49.80. According to Nelson, that took about 25 seconds off his previous personal best.
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