MOUNT MORRIS, N.Y. – The Cortland men's cross country team placed ninth in a field of 24 teams at the Mike Woods Cross Country Invitational, hosted by Geneseo at Letchworth State Park.

The Red Dragons finished with a score of 292 points, four ahead of St. John Fisher. Geneseo (33), Ithaca (78) and Brockport (112) took the top three spots.

Chad Dunham (Central Square/Paul V. Moore) and Mike Verde (Hopewell Junction/Arlington) were Cortland's top two finishers on the 8,000-meter course in basically identical finishes. Dunham was officially 50th out of 314 runners who completed the race with a time of 27:21.0, and Verde was 51st in 27:21.9. Sean McAneny of Geneseo won the race in 25:21.8.

Dan Gross (East Moriches/Center Moriches) placed 82nd in 27:52.6 and Ryan Konotopskyj (East Amherst/Williamsville North) was 93rd in 28:08.9. James Forte (Merrick/Sanford H. Calhoun) crossed the finish line in 105th place (28:24.4), Nolan Vest (Coram/Longwood) was 107th (28:27.6), and John Meskos (Fayetteville/Fayetteville-Manlius) rounded out Cortland's top seven in 121st place (28:45.1).

The Red Dragons will compete at the Lehigh University Paul Short Run next Saturday, Oct. 5.

Complete Results:
Women
Men

Coach's Corner - Comments from Cortland Head Coach Steve Patrick:

The women's team had an outstanding day out there!  Getting in front of TCNJ – a team that is ranked regionally and nationally this fall, and that was an NCAA qualifier last fall – is a great measure or things going well for the program!  We still have room for improvement – we're inclined to believe that pretty much everybody can run faster with more experience racing as well as more training – but certainly saw some great things today, and it wasn't limited to our top five.  In particular our freshmen ladies did some great work, as Sera King, Lexi MacAneney, Rachel Castello, and Samantha Kenny all had significant PRs in their second 6k of their careers, while Marlee Angus and McKenzie Dombroski ran quite well in their first attempts at the championship distance.  Kenzie earned a spot in our all-time top 10 list for freshmen, which is quite an achievement considering that in the past we have pretty much only run this course for conference and regional championships.  On the other end of the spectrum, the seniors that ran today – Courtney Maurin and Jill Leggiero – were both excellent and did a lot to help with the team's overall performance, and both ran one of the faster times of their career.
 
I wish I could say that the men's team had as good of a day, but momma always told me that I shouldn't lie.  We actually had a better day than our results would indicate, as a number of our younger team members made good progress with PRs or near-PRs on what turned out to be a pretty hot day.  Three of the guys that had been in our top 5 weren't up there today, mostly due to injury or illness, and that had a big impact on our score, but we also had people really step up and do some great things.  In particular, Dan Gross, in his first cross country season with us, ran a tremendous race, and was pretty close to his fastest 5k ever on the way to his fastest 8k ever.  It's always awesome to see somebody progress like that through his career!  It was also a great sign that our 4/5/6 runners on the day – Ryan Konotopskyj, James Forte, and Nolan Vest are all seniors coming back from an injury that has limited them through the past couple of weeks or in some cases through a lot of the summer.  Our next three men – John Meskos, Gavin Watkins, and Josh Nogaret – are all freshmen. While the overall results weren't what we had expected on the day, we are pretty positive about the direction we are heading in.
 
On a related note, the past couple of weekends have been pretty tremendous for Cortland XC/TF alumni – with Jack Flood finishing fourth in the Thorpe Cup (the annual USA – Germany decathlon competition), Melique Garcia, representing Honduras, finishing third in his heat in the 100 meters at the IAAF World Championships in Doha, Qatar, and Cortland sprinting legend Stefan Mascoll being inducted into the C Club Hall of Fame on Saturday!