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Lobos Dazzle Home Crowd at UNM Lobo Invitational
Men upend Air Force for second-straight win; Gallegos leads women to second.
Sept. 16, 2002
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. - The University of New Mexico men's and women's cross country teams made a triumphant return to the UNM North Golf Course with a pair of stellar performances in their 2002 home-opener, the UNM Lobo Invitational, on Saturday morning. The Lobo men cruised to their second-straight victory, 21 points ahead of runner-up Air Force, while the women finished a strong second behind the Falcon women. New Mexico¹s men used an outstanding group effort to best the 12-team field and remain undefeated on the season. The win was also UNM¹s first over Mountain West Conference and NCAA Mountain Region rival Air Force under third-year head coach Matt Henry. The Falcons began the season ranked just ahead of New Mexico in the national preseason poll, but were picked to finish fourth, one spot behind the Lobos, in the MWC preseason poll. Junior Ben Ortega paced the squad early on, running in second for most of the 8,000-meter race, behind the eventual winner, Ben Payne of Air Force. Three-fourths into the race sophomore Cameron Clarke led a surging trio of Lobos, including junior Matthew Gonzales and freshman Jeremy Johnson, up through the field. Junior Nick Martinez fended off a pair of runners from UTEP and Air Force to move into the top-10 and join the lead pack. Payne never faltered down the stretch, going wire-to-wire for a hard-fought victory (24:01), his second-straight at the UNM Lobo Invitational. However, New Mexico easily wrapped up the team title with its tremendous group running as Clarke (24:03), Ortega (24:07), Gonzales (24:07), Johnson (24:11) finished second through fourth, respectively, with Martinez (24:38) close behind in seventh. UTEP¹s Bashar Ibrahim (24:41), the defending Western Athletic Conference champion, was the only other runner to breakup the Lobo pack, finishing sixth. UNM junior Sean Flahery (13th - 25:22) and freshman Brandon Vigil (16th - 25:28) rounded out the Lobos¹ top-seven.
On the women¹s side, sophomore Jacquelyne Gallegos led an impressive, gutty
performance by New Mexico, which was without junior Sarah Gonzales, the
2001 Lobo Invitational champion, who was held out due to illness. Gallegos
improved nine spots on finish last fall, running second from start to
finish to complete the 6,000-meter course in 22:45. Rachael Cuellar of New
Mexico State was the wire-to-wire winner, finishing 41 seconds ahead of
Gallegos. However, the Lobos avenged their 10-point loss to the Aggies on
Aug. 30 in the season-opener finishing 66 points ahead of fourth place NMSU
and 17 points better than third place Texas Tech. Air Force placed all five
scoring runners in the top-10 to defeat New Mexico 39-61.
Sophomore Racquel Ricci (23:31) and freshman Janice Tosa (23:31) also turned in fine performances, running side-by-side to finish 11th and 12th, respectively, while freshman Karina Hill-Hurtado (23:50) was close behind in 14th. Junior transfer Amanda Swann (24:12) capped the Lobo scoring with a 22nd place finish, while sophomore Vanessa Funston (27th - 24:26) and Timmie Murphy (28th - 24:26) rounded out the UNM top-seven. ³I¹m real happy with how we ran today,² said Henry. ³This was a great, memorable day for us, but we can¹t get too pleased with ourselves. We have to continue to train hard in practice and focus on achieving the higher goals that we¹ve set for ourselves at the Mountain West Conference meet and NCAA Regionals. Next we go to Stanford, which will be a very tough meet, so we have to get right back to work.² The UNM men and women travel to Palo Alto, Calif. in two weeks for the elite Stanford Cross Country Invitational on Sep. 28. |
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