By Amber Albe '19 / Sports Information Intern
WILLIMANTIC, Conn. -- This past weekend, the men and women's cross country teams ran at their second competition of the season at the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth. Of the 37 schools competing in the women's race, the Warriors came in 12th place overall over the 5,000 meter course. Of the 33 schools competing over the 8,000 meter men's course, the Warriors came in 23rd overall.
Despite the relatively flat running course, coach Kathy Manizza described the meet as having its ups and its downs. Within the first 200 yards of the men's race, Manizza explained, there was a runner who fell and made a large pileup that caused Eastern runners Christopher Armstrong (Bolton), Noah Hallisey (East Lyme), and Michael Underwood (Farmington) to fall as well.
"The course at UMass starts in a huge, open field, then narrows to only about six runners across very quickly," said Manizza. "I told the men to go out fast to avoid the pack of 250-plus runners. I did not even know about the falls until the end of the race. I was on my way to the first mile marker when they had fallen."
Manizza furthered that despite the fall, the Eastern men tried to come back, but felt the effects of the attempt to catch up and the fall itself toward the end of the course. Even so, Armstrong, the men's senior captain, was Eastern's first-place runner at 102nd place, with a time of 27:56.20. The top five scorers also include junior Ryan Jones (Suffield) at 124th with a time of 28:16.87, Hallisey, a junior, at 128th with a time of 28:19.60, Underwood, a senior, at 167th with a time of 29:34.81, and sophomore Max Armstrong (Ledyard) at 178th with a time of 29:54.90.
Despite the fall for the men, there were a few who improved this year from last, such as Armstrong's two-second drop. The men were without two of their top runners in junior Cooper Goslin (South Windsor) and freshman Georgios Sfakios (Willimantic). Goslin missed the meet due to personal commitments and Sfakios has not yet competed due to injury.
The women had a very different competition from the men. Manizza was very excited to see the times of the women: "You never really know if all of the training we are doing is going to pay off. The only way to monitor that is to compete. And the girls really brought it at this meet," praised Manizza. "The 20-minute mark is a big milestone for a lot of runners, and many of the girls surpassed that mark this weekend with personal bests. The girls exceeded my expectations".
Comprising the five scoring runners were senior captain Mariah McPhee (Bristol), who placed 38th with a time of 19:20, junior Kassandrah Banks (Wethersfield) with a 73rd place finish and a time of 19:53.33, sophomore Samantha McKosky (Deep River) in 79th with a time of 20:02.22, freshman Rachel Osak (Portland) at 103rd place with a time of 20:26.21, and junior Amanda Terenzi (Coventry, RI) at 110th place with a time of 20:33.78.
McPhee chopped 55 seconds off her time on this course from a year ago, Terenzi an astounding three minutes.
With sophomore Megan Albert (Plantsville) still injured, Manizza explained that Osak, although running only the second race of her career, played a large role, having to step up and fill in the missing places. Albert is expected to return for the next meet of the season on Saturday, Oct. 1 at the Community College of Rhode Island Tri-State Open.
Already thinking about the Little East Conference meet at the end of October, Manizza notes that the overall place of the women was only three spots behind traditional conference winner Keene State College, which was ninth overall. The Warriors finished well ahead of LEC rivals University of Southern Maine (16th), Plymouth State University (20th), UMass Dartmouth (24th), Rhode Island College (28th) and UMass Boston (32nd).
Through the first two meets of the year. Coach Manizza is pleased with the progress of both the men and the women thus far.
