ITHACA, N.Y. - The Cortland men's and women's cross country teams competed at the non-team scoring Cornell University John Reif Memorial Run on Friday afternoon. 
 
Cortland's top finisher on the men's side of the 5,000-meter race was Kevin Moser (Camillus/West Genesee), who placed 29th out of 49 runners in 17 minutes, 10.5 seconds. The race featured a number of runners from Division I schools Syracuse, Cornell and St. Peter's, along with some unattached runners. 
 
Mike Alvarez (Newburgh/Newburgh Free Academy) placed 31st (17:23.7), right alongside Liam Boyd (Red Hook) in 32nd place (17:23.8). Hector Ramos (Evans Mills/Indian River) was 33rd (17:26.9), Eric DeHart (Apalachin/Vestal) placed 34th (17:33.0), Joshua Osae (Valley Stream/Valley Stream South) was 36th (17:34.1) and Anthony Cawley (Jamesville/Jamesville-DeWitt) finished 37th (17:36.7). 
 
On the women's side, Aliesha Howard (Marathon) was Cortland's top performer in 15th place out of 26 runners in 21:46.7 over 5,000 meters. The field primarily consisted of runners from Syracuse, Cornell and Cortland. Jewel Jones (Long Beach) finished in 16th place (22:15.9), Riley Meckley (Port Jefferson/Ward Melville) ended in 17th place (22:21.4) and Jade Hornick (Valley Stream/Valley Stream South) was 18th (22:25.1). Rounding out the Red Dragons' top seven were Amelia Konstanty (Lockport/Royalton Hartland) in 19th (22:33.8), Mia Hannan (Lynbrook/Sacred Heart Academy) in 20th (22:37.8) and Sarah Kiefer (Cold Spring Harbor) in 21st (22:39.8). 
 
Cortland returns to action on Saturday, October 28, at the SUNYAC Championships in Oneonta. 


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

Today was a pretty exceptional day for the Red Dragons that we took over to Cornell. For both teams, we had some tremendous efforts!
 
To provide a bit of context, this meet is run as a co-ed 5k, and since it is the week before most conference championship meets, there usually isn't a big field. That means that a number of our athletes – especially on the women's side – end up running an effort that is much closer to a time trial then a race; or at a minimum the athletes are only out there racing each other.
 
For the women, when comparing to the last 5k these ladies ran at Hamilton, nine out of 10 ran faster, and one ran essentially the same time. That's a great day for the team! Jewel Jones ran over a minute faster; Sophie Marra was 53 seconds faster – both of which are pretty tremendous achievements! We definitely saw some great 'push' by the team in the middle of the race where we really fought against feeling disconnected, and it paid off!
 
For the men, we don't have a 5k to compare to from this year, but it is worth noting that Anthony Cawley ran faster than his track 5k PR, and Joshua Osae nearly equaled his track 5k PR. Considering the challenge of the terrain, surface, and rain, that demonstrates a really good effort! It looks like most of the other men either set or were near 5k cross country PRs; considering the relatively youth of the squad that we brought today, that's a good sign. The guys benefited from having a field of folks to race against more than the ladies, and took advantage of it by really working the 2nd mile of the race, which is something we have been emphasizing.
 
While some of our squad is finished with their cross country season, the rest are sharpening their skills for the upcoming SUNYAC Championships next Saturday in Oneonta.