UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. – The No. 27-ranked Utah women's cross country team continued its season Friday at the Penn State National Open in University Park, Pa., taking 10th place overall. A total of 28 teams, including five top-ranked teams, competed in the event.
It marked the first 6K event for the Utes this season and Utah would go onto total 286 points in the meet. The Utes were led by freshman
Scarlet Dale, who finished 20th among collegiate competitors with a time of 21.06.
"It is kind of mixed bag from today's meet," said Utah head coach
Kyle Kepler. "We were led again by our freshman,
Scarlet Dale, who was running as high as third-place early in the race, but ended up finishing in 20th-place overall. This was a much tougher course than we have ran all season and the weather yesterday did not help much."
Junior
Sarah Feeny captured a top-35 finish, coming in 33rd overall with a time of 21:15, while redshirt freshman
Cara Woolnough took third on the team, 51st overall, with a time of 21:28. Freshman
Kennedy Powell (21:49) was 87th overall, while sophomore
Aubrey Argyle (21:52) rounded out Utah's scoring after crossing the finish line in 95th-place.
Freshman
Sophie Ryan (21:54) finished in 101st-place and sophomore
Natalie Platil (21:58) crossed the line in 109th overall. Senior
Sadie Wassum (22:06), along with juniors
Nicole Griffiths (22:07),
Sarah Newton (22:21) and
Caitlin Faust (23:02), and freshman
Sara Leonard (23:10) capped off Utah's runners for the day.
"For the most part, our kids ran great and did a good job. We have a young team and when you add in a course they have never raced and then an extra 1,000 meters, it all adds up. We are not making any excuses. We will learn from this meet and take that into the remainder of our season as we prepare for both Pac-12 and Regional Championship meets."
Meet host, No. 19-ranked Penn State, won the event with three Nittany Lions registering top-10 finishes and the squad collecting a total of 62 points. No. 14-ranked Michigan State was second in the team standings with 87 points, and No. 26-ranked Georgia Tech rounded out the top-three with 143 total points.
Utah will be back in action again next week hosting the Utah Open, which is set for next Friday, Oct. 19. The event will be held at Sunnyside Park in Salt Lake City, with a start time slated for 1 p.m.