DENVER— Colorado Mesa University sophomore Clayton Wilson turned in the top NCAA Division II finish while leading the Maverick men's cross country team to a solid fourth place team finish on Saturday at the Roadrunners Invitational here at Washington Park.
 
Wilson finished 12^th overall with an 8-kilometer time of 25 minutes, 43.7 seconds as the Mavericks recorded a team score of 91 points while finishing higher than two NCAA Division I foes and two Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference rivals in the 9-team field.  He was tenth in the tam soring chase as two of the runners ahead of him ran unattached.
 
The other nine were NCAA Division I runners.
 
Fellow Maverick sophomore Colton White was just behind Wilson in 15^th place with a time of 25:53.9 while scoring 12 points.
 
NCAA Division I Colorado, ranked sixth nationally in the U.S. Track & Field and Cross Country Coaches Association's Preseason Poll, had the top five and seven of the top ten runners to win the meet with a perfect score of 15 points.  Wyoming had the seventh and place eighth finishers but could only manage a fifth place team score of 128 points as the Mavericks had five runners in front of the Cowboys' third.
 
The Colorado School of Mines, ranked second the NCAA Division II rankings, finished second in the team standings with 84 points and had their top runner— Cole Fiorillo— finished 14^th in between Wilson and White.
 
Division I Air Force, ranked 23^rd, took third with 87 points, just four ahead of the Mavs, who finished well ahead of their other two RMAC rivals in MSU Denver (148) and Regis (218).
 
Division I Northern Colorado finished seventh with 204 points in between the Roadrunners and Rangers while Colorado Northwestern finished ninth with 280 points as the only full junior college team.
 
The Mavs' No. 3 finisher was freshman Daxin Holtzen, who made his collegiate debut with a respectable 25^th place time of 26:19.6, which was good for 21 points to the Mavs' total.
 
Owen Frank was three places behind in 26:24.5 and scored 23 points while Chase Brown took 30^th in 26;27.1 to contribute the final 30 points to the Mavs' total.
 
The Maverick women also posted  strong second place finish out of ten teams, beating both No. 4 Mines and No. 7 UCCS as well as three Division I foes.

A separate group of Maverick runners were also in Gunnison on Saturday, competing at the Mountaineer/Cowboy Invitational to help Western Colorado University make its' home meet a countable meet.  Kyle Towne led the group of Maverick middle distance runners with a 33^rd place time of 31:27.0.