Utah Cross Country Takes Sixth at MWC Championships

Mergaert leads the Utes with a 28th-place finish.

Oct. 31, 2009

OREM, Utah - The University of Utah women's cross country team competed at the Mountain West Conference Championships Saturday afternoon at the Cascade Golf Course. The Utes were led by freshman Amanda Mergaert as they placed sixth in the race. New Mexico claimed the conference title in both men's and women's cross country.

Mergaert was the first runner across the line once again for Utah. The Ute completed the six-kilometer course in 22:53.1 for 28th-place overall (27 pts). Freshman Jenny McCune finished in 22:50.0 for 30th place (29 pts).

The third scoring runner for Utah was freshman Megan Combe with a time of 23:49.4 for 43rd-place overall (40 pts). Redshirt freshman Lucy Yates had a time of 24:07.3 to earn 48th place (45 pts). Senior Sydney Osmun rounded out Utah's top-five finishers on Saturday, finishing in 24:43.6 and 60th-place overall.

The Utes finished in sixth-place overall with 195 points to beat out TCU (196), San Diego State (207), and UNLV (210).

Thoughts from Utah head coach Kyle Kepler:
"We didn't have our best team race today, but we survived a bad day. I have to give a lot of credit to the kids. We got off to a poor start but in the last 800 meters they made up a lot of points. They finished hard and refused to quit, earning every point they could. We had higher goals obviously, but between illness and injury we had to mesh the group together. Alexis Davis has been in bed the past three days and Megan Combe ran through her foot injury. It is tough to argue about that kind of effort, so I am proud of them. We have two weeks to get ready for the regional meet, so we'll start preparing for that."

Up Next
The University of Utah cross country team will be competing in the NCAA Mountain Regional Meet on Nov. 14 in Albuquerque, N.M.