Owls XC Hosts NCAA Regional; Men, Women Place 18th

WESTFIELD, Mass. -- Westfield State's men's and women's cross country teams each finished 18^th at the NCAA Division III Mideast Regional hosted by the Owls at Stanley Park on Saturday.

The Owls men were led by Nathan Sylven in 69^th place with a time of 26:28 on the 8,000-meter course.

The Owl women were highlighted by Shea Hamel's 69^th place finish, as she ran the women's 6,000-meter course in 23:11.

Williams College won the women's race, and earned the Mideast Region's automatic bid to the NCAA championship with a team score of 61 points, outdistancing NECSCAC foe Amherst, which placed second with 109, and Connecticut College, which was third at 125.

Williams' senior Genna Girard ran away with the race's individual title, in 20:40.8, more than 15 seconds ahead of runner up Audrey Maclean, a freshman from Middlebury College, who completed the course in 20:56.1.  Coast Guard's Paige Phillips was third in 21:01.08.

Ella Ball was next in for Williams in 11^th as the Ephwomen placed their top five runners in the meet's top 20.

174 runners contested the meet with 24 teams scoring.

On the men's side, RPI's Cory Kennedy held off Williams' Nikhil DeNatale to win the race.  Kennedy came home in 23:56.7, just two seconds off the course and meet record (set by Tufts' Tim Nichols at the 2016 NCAA regional).

DeNatale was just a couple steps behind in 23:58.6.

RPI's Vince Simonetti was third, and Williams' John Lucey fourth as the two teams vied for the team title.

Williams came out on top with a score of 47 to RPI's 5, with the decision largely coming down to Eph's fifth-man Chris Ratliffe coming home in 16^th, while RPI's fifth man Justin Gibbons was 12 spots back in 28^th.  Middlebury College finished third with 72 points.

Williams College's men's earned the league's automatic bid to next weekend's NCAA Championship Meet in Big Spring, Pa., which will be hosted by Dickinson College.

For Westfield, Abdi Nassir was the second man across the finish line in 27:56 and 109^th place.  John Nekitopoulos was 110^th in 28:01.  Gordon Johnson hit the tape in 113^th in 28:05, and Will Buckley finished 117^th in 28:09.

173 individual runners competed as 25 teams scored at the meet.

For the Owls' women, Molly Kennedy was 87^th in 23:45, Julianne Kelly 105^th in 24:35, Brynne LeCours 106^th in 24:39, and Eliza Lee 124^th in 25:05 to round out the scoring five.

The meet completes the Owls season.   Westfield was hosting an NCAA Cross Country regional at Stanley Park for the fourth time since 2002.  Westfield hosted in 2002, 2012 and 2016.

The course is entirely contained within Stanley Park, which  consists of nearly 300+ acres of trails, woods, picnic areas, recreational facilities, and gardens, which include the Rose & Flower Garden, Asian Garden, a Rhododendron Display Garden, The Arboretum, Herb Garden, and Woodland Wildflower Garden. There is the Frank Stanley Beveridge Wildlife Sanctuary, the Carillon Tower, and a Duck Pond with a Colonial-era Village that includes an orchard, mill and waterwheel, an old town meeting house, covered bridge, carriage shed, blacksmith shop, and arched bridges all with a backdrop of flowering azaleas and rhododendron.