Cross country men second, women third at George Kyte Invitational

September 09, 2008

The 2008 season got underway for the Arizona State University cross country team Saturday afternoon at the George Kyte Invitational in Flagstaff, Ariz., with the Sun Devil men placing second overall and the women third at the meet hosted by Northern Arizona at Buffalo Park. Newcomer <a href="http://thesundevils.cstv.com/sports/c-xc/mtt/shannon_noah00.html">Noah Shannon</a> led the charge for the men as he was the lone Sun Devil to place in the Top 10 on the day while the women were led by <a href="http://thesundevils.cstv.com/sports/c-xc/mtt/blue_whitney00.html">Whitn… Blue</a>. In the overall team standings, the Lumberjacks of NAU swept the team titles as both the men and women scored 21 points. The Sun Devil men scored 57 points to take second place while Arizona was third with 62. That order was reversed in the women’s standings as the Wildcats took second with 47 points while the Sun Devils scored 85 points to finish third. The men finished up the day with the 8,000m race in the elevations of the high country of Arizona as Shannon, in his first race with ASU after transferring in from Wisconsin, clocked a time of 27:12.1 to finish ninth overall. Two redshirt freshmen that also were making their debuts for the Sun Devils followed Shannon across the line as <a href="http://thesundevils.cstv.com/sports/c-xc/mtt/lovell_daniel00.html">Dani… Lovell</a> was 12th (27:26.9) and <a href="http://thesundevils.cstv.com/sports/c-xc/mtt/petersen_thomas00.html">Th… Petersen</a><a href="http://thesundevils.cstv.com/sports/c-xc/mtt/eckelman_collin00.html">Co… Eckelman</a> was 18th (27:40.5) and <a href="http://thesundevils.cstv.com/sports/c-xc/mtt/nobles_craig00.html">Craig Nobles</a> 27th (28:55.9) to round out the Top 5 finishers that make up the team scoring. <a href="http://thesundevils.cstv.com/sports/c-xc/mtt/hall_jordan00.html">Jordan Hall</a> and <a href="http://thesundevils.cstv.com/sports/c-xc/mtt/anderson_michael00.html">M… Anderson</a>, both redshirt freshmen running in their first races for ASU, also competed for the team and placed 31st (29:15.1) and 35th (29:42.8), respectively. was 14th (27:32.0). The women’s 5,000m race opened the day’s competition with the Sun Devils running as a team with all seven athletes crossing the line in succession and within 1.5 seconds of one another. Blue was the top finisher for the Sun Devils as she crossed the line in 19:51.9 to finish 16th overall. A pair of senior transfers, <a href="http://thesundevils.cstv.com/sports/c-xc/mtt/paul_haley00.html">Haley Paul</a> (Washington State) and <a href="http://thesundevils.cstv.com/sports/c-xc/mtt/olding_sunni00.html">Sunni Olding</a> (Notre Dame), placed 17th (19:52.2) and 18th (19:52.4), respectively, in their first ASU races while <a href="http://thesundevils.cstv.com/sports/c-xc/mtt/olson_camille00.html">Cami… Olson</a> (19th at 19:52.7) and <a href="http://thesundevils.cstv.com/sports/c-xc/mtt/kingma_jenna00.html">Jenna Kingma</a> (20th at 19:52.9) rounded out the Top 5 team scorers. Also running in the meet were <a href="http://thesundevils.cstv.com/sports/c-xc/mtt/spadafino_angela00.html">A… Spadafino</a> and <a href="http://thesundevils.cstv.com/sports/c-xc/mtt/kielty_ali00.html">Ali Kielty</a>, who placed 21st (19:53.1) and 22nd (19:53.4), respectively. After a weekend off from competition, the Sun Devils will return to action on Friday, September 19, as they travel to Tucson for the Dave Murray Invitational, hosted by Arizona.