UNIVERSITY PLACE, Wash.— Kira MacGill finished tenth out of 236 runners to lead the Colorado Mesa University women's cross country to a top-half and 14
th place finish at the D-II Pre Nationals meet on Saturday here at the Chambers Creek Regional Park.
As a team, the Mavericks scored 348 points to finish in the top half of the 29-team field, which got a chance to preview the course that this years NCAA Division II National Championships will be contested on in December.
MacGill completed the 6-kilometer race in 21 minutes, 22.4 seconds as one of seven Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference runners in the top ten.
The Colorado School of Mines, ranked third in the country, had four of those to post a team score of just 37 points en-route to a 51-point win over No. 11 Western Colorado, which had two runners in the top 10.
No. 20 Biola was third with 151 while No. 12 Chico State (194) and Cal State East Bay (213) rounded out the top five teams. RMAC rival Westminster was sixth with 223. 29
th-ranked Western Washington finished eighth with 242 points.
Individually,
Kendall White was CMU's second finisher, placing 53
rd in 22:29.4 while
Ricky Maestas (96
th, 23:10.2) and
Alyssa Britton (99
th, 23:18.40) also cracked the top 100.
Jessie Beck (23:50.70), Elaina Arcaand (23:54.5) and
Arianna Kincaid (24:54.1) also finished for the Mavs, placing 128
th, 131
st and 173
rd, respectively.
Saturday's meet was the first large meet of the season for the Mavericks, who will next compete at the RMAC Championships on Nov. 5 in Durango, Colorado.
The Maverick men finished eighth out of 27 teams with 243 points.