Official Patriot League Recap
HAMILTON, N.Y. – American University earned three All-Patriot League honors on Saturday as the men placed fifth and the women were sixth at the PL Cross Country Championships hosted by Colgate.
Freshman
Kassidy Ayres was 11th individually in the women's race, earning second-team honors. Runners from first through seventh in each race were on the first team, and places eight through 14 were second-team recipients.
The Eagle men finished fifth in the team standings, scoring 103 points. AU was fifth also last year, but amassed 111 points in the 2014 meet, held at Lehigh.
Johnson led AU to the line with a time of 25:10.3 over the 8-kilometer course, nine seconds ahead of Tirba (25:19.6). The Eagle sophomore moved up to AU's number-two position for the third time this season and the second time in the last two meets.
Senior
Joshua Ellis was 25th in 25:40.0, freshman
Matthew Rainey was 34th in 25:58.1 and sophomore
Sam Doud was 43rd in 26:12.8. Freshman
Tom Dengler (43rd, 26:12.8) was in the sixth spot for the Eagles.
Rainey finished as the second freshman in the field, as Alexander Seal of Boston University earned PL Male Rookie of the Year with his eight-place finish.
"Our overall team performance was good," said AU head coach Matt Centrowitz. "In some small areas we could have done better, but we had some outstanding individual results. They represented American very well."
Ayres covered the women's 6K course in 22:00.4, leading the Eagles to the line. She finished third among freshmen in the field, as Navy's Erin McDonnell earned Female Rookie of the Year with her seventh-place finish.
The Eagles' sixth-place finish was one spot better in the team standings than a year ago, and AU's point total of 174 was a 40-point improvement from the 2014 race.
Ayres and Hooks were 1-2 for the Eagles in all six races this season.
"Our women competed very well considering the sickness and injury we had late in the season," said Centrowitz. "We had to leave some good runners at home. We are very excited to improve on last year's performance, and we are only graduating one out of our top five with two freshmen. We have a bright future ahead of us and look forward to going into indoor track season strong with our full team."
Navy swept the first four places on the men's side to earn the team championship, scoring just 19 points. Boston University was second with 88, with Army in third at 91 and Lehigh in fourth at 95.
Navy junior Lucas Stalnaker won the individual title and PL Male Runner of the Year in 25:00.2, just three-tenths of a second ahead of senior teammate Stephen Schroeder.
The top four Midshipmen finished within two seconds of each other.
AU bested Bucknell, which was ranked 10th in the latest Mid-Atlantic Region coaches' rankings.
Bucknell finished 2-3-4 in the women's race to out-score Navy, 34-51, for the women's title. Boston U. was third with 104. Senior Kelley Robinson of Navy won the women's individual title in 21:14.0, scoring a nine-second win over Bucknell junior Catherine Scott.
Photo by Phil Inglis/Colgate Athletics
