Cross country teams both take ninth place

The cross-country team traveled to Mobile on Sunday, Nov. 2, and participated in the Sun Belt Cross Country Championships. The men’s and women’s teams both took home ninth place.

In the women’s 5K, sophomore Mikayla Hodges set a personal-best time of 18:19.2, while leading the Trojans in 29th place. Second to finish for Troy was junior Julia Ostendorf in 31st with a time of 18:29.5.

Teammate sophomore Marsel Mosley was the next Trojan across the finish line at 18:46.6. Freshmen Sarah Zylstra and Samantha Smith finished close together, at 19:26.9 and 19:50.7 respectively.

“We had a few season personal records,” head coach Elliott Blount said. “However, we lacked the competitiveness in the heart of the race, which cost us one or two places in the overall finish.”

The men’s team was led by freshman Dylan Ogburn, who took 45th place, at 27:09.1 in the 8K race. Close behind was sophomore Sean Kent, with a time of 27:23.4, and third for the Trojans was sophomore Timothy Bulger at 27:53.0.

Freshmen Joe Giese, Eric Schueller and Cameron McCutheon all finished consecutively, ending 29:03.7, 29:06.6, and 30:04.6, correspondingly.

Blount was dissatisfied with the team’s performance.

“We failed to play to our strengths, and with such a small margin of error it showed,” Blount said. “We got separated early and were unable to recover.”

Troy competes in the NCAA Division I South Region XC Championship on Friday, Nov. 14.